


House of Cards

by Sapphylicious



Category: KAT-TUN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vigilante Group, Multi, too much fun with the card theme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-21
Updated: 2014-01-21
Packaged: 2018-01-09 12:22:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 41,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1145933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphylicious/pseuds/Sapphylicious
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Starting over is easier said than done. A kidnapping leads Jin back to the past—to the Suicide King and the Black Court. His new, normal life is at stake, but is it really worth keeping?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for [Mec](http://becroberts.livejournal.com/) as part of [Kizuna Exchange 2011.](http://kizuna-exchange.livejournal.com/)

He picked up the call after the third ring.

"Takumi," he said, straightforwardly rude yet matched by perfunctory politeness. He slipped two fingers between the plastic slats of the window blinds and parted them to reveal a slash of pale dawn light. Shades of gray permeated Tokyo for time being. 

Those who dealt with Takumi in person compared him to an actor, but they couldn't say whether he was a good one; his mannerisms were a little too practiced, the degree of his bows a little too precise, his words too carefully selected but at the same time too brazenly spoken. The foreign directness wasn't masked, merely dressed in cultural courtesy for a while. But it was difficult to say just how much pretending was going on beneath that.

As he listened to the voice in his ear he withdrew his hand to press over his eyes, almost as though to hide his weary expression. "You called this number just to tell me that?" The man called Takumi sank into a chair, the straight line of his back beginning to uncharacteristically slouch. "No, don't bother. I don't want to even hear that name."

He listened some more, then frowned and sat upright again. "Eh?"

His back was to the window, expression shadowed, but his next words lashed in brief, precise strokes. "Fine, but be discreet. No one else is to know. If nothing comes up, drop it." His fingers tightened on the phone. "If that happens, I'll take responsibility. Don't contact me again on this line."

He ended the call. After a moment's thought he also turned off the phone and tossed it in the vicinity of the bed, taut lines going slack again as he slumped backwards. The cracks between the blinds slowly brightened by degrees and he closed his eyes against them. It would be good if Takumi could just disappear for a while until night fell again.

♥ || ♠

The large minute hand of the obscenely expensive watch on his wrist said it was about fifteen after as Jin blew through the revolving glass doors, and barely avoided getting the large duffle bag swinging from his shoulder caught in them. He hadn't meant to be late—in fact he'd been aiming for early, but things happened as they happened and Yamapi would understand. The girl waiting for him, however, might not. That was the incentive that made him hurry across the posh lobby, giving the concierge a quick wave that also happened to flash the diamonds adorning his watch as if to say, _look, I belong here, I'm not suspicious at all!_

Of course, it probably would have helped if he'd dressed up rather than his usual down, but even multi-millionaires and business tycoons had casual days, right? And it was Sunday morning on top of that. Only a very special person could get Jin up and moving on such a day, and at such an hour.

Jin hopped into an elevator, jabbing the floor number and close doors buttons before the staff could think to question him. He wasn't accused of theft very often; that would involve getting caught. Not that he had reason to be caught either. Not usually.

The elevator rolled to a gentle stop and dinged cheerily as the doors swept open. Jin breezed down the expanse of ugly carpet that pervaded even luxury apartment complexes until he reached door number 3506.

"Hey," he said sheepishly when Yamapi opened up. "Sorry I'm late."

His friend quirked a brow at him, and was still in the process of putting his tie on. "Actually you're on time. And since I was anticipating your usual pace, in that sense you're early. Congratulations, you may be an adult yet."

"No shit?" Jin stepped in and checked his watch again but the display still read a quarter after. His phone was the same. "Oh," he said, realization punching him right in the gut. Rosa had kept the clocks set ahead and must have changed his personal belongings to match. She was kind of a control freak; it was either her way or the highway. And, well, Jin had no choice but to hit the road after what felt like being unceremoniously dumped on the sidewalk.

"That bad?" No surprise Yamapi could tell with just that single utterance. Never mind they hadn't seen each other in over a year. Although the fact that Jin saw fit to come back to Japan after the breakup probably said a lot, too.

Jin dropped his bag and kicked off his shoes, mumbling, "Whatever." He'd done most of his moping already, back in LA. Once there'd been a ring fund, and a couple days later there was a plane ticket (as well as a fee for breaking his apartment lease). That was over and done with. Jin puffed out his cheeks and injected some cheer into his tone. Probably wasn't the least bit convincing, but points for trying. "Anyway, I'll have you know there's only one true love of my life." 

Yamapi threw open his arms and deadpanned, "Come. Leap into my bosom, and we'll shed manly tears."

"GROSS." Jin was unable to help laughing, gloom dissipating in the face of Yamapi's proposal. "Your unspeakable man boobs aside, what would Keiko say?"

"She'd rescue me from your vile, gold-digging clutches and take away your visitation rights," Yamapi said smugly.

Jin's eyes went wide with horror. "Keiko can keep your fat ass, but not my Raimu-chan!" He leaned over to peer around Yamapi and brightened when he saw the little girl peeking out at them from her bedroom. "Hi, Raimu-chan!"

"Who the hell is _your_ Raimu-chan?" Yamapi muttered too low to be heard by young ears. "She probably doesn't even remember you."

"Language!" Jin hissed back, elbowing Yamapi aside to crouch down at level with his friend's daughter. If you asked him she had her mother's looks and not a bit of Yamapi's stupid face. "Of course she remembers me, don't you, Raimu-chan? I was the totally awesome guy who sang at your birthday party."

"That was her fourth birthday party. She's five now," Yamapi pointed out.

"Five already? Wow, that's a lot. Do you know how many that is?"

Raimu stared at him with big eyes, holding a fist in front of her smiling mouth. Then shyly, she thrust her hand forward with all five fingers splayed. Jin stuck his palm out too and slapped it lightly against hers, grinning ear to ear.

"Good job! You must get your brains from your mom."

Raimu giggled and high-fived him again.

"Oh my God," Yamapi groaned as if just now realizing his mistake. "When I come back you'll have brainwashed her against me. She's too innocent to know better."

Jin gathered her up in his arms and regarded her seriously. "Did you hear that? Your dad insulted you. How dare he! You know a great guy when you see him."

"It's not too late to call her usual babysitter," Yamapi warned, but then he was met with not one, but two faces of puppy-eyed sadness.

"I want Jin-niichan," Raimu said, proving she did in fact remember him.

Yamapi crumbled like a sandcastle to a pair of bullies at the beach. Jin whirled Raimu around in a victory dance.

When Yamapi finished beating his head against the wall in defeat things had settled down and both Jin and Raimu were seated at the table with cups of yogurt. Judging by the look he gave them Jin knew he was thinking: _one kid babysitting another..._ Jin stuck his tongue out (he was twenty-nine and nine at heart), and decided not to tell Yamapi he had a red spot on his forehead, made all the more conspicuous by his combed back hair.

He didn't entirely know what Yamapi did for a living anymore. Probably wasn't allowed to know and definitely didn't want to know. Jin was sure the business card boasted something impressive and legit, and the credentials were real, but there was definitely something imperceptibly missing on the résumé. In any case, Jin didn't think he'd ever be used to things like the upscale three bedroom apartment he was crashing in for a while, but Yamapi was still Yamapi and that had nothing to do with anything else. The emergency business travel on weekends must suck, though.

"Hello?" Yamapi paused in putting on his designer Italian shoes to answer his cell's no-nonsense business ringtone. Jin made a mental note to change it to something suitably incriminating later. "Yes, I'm on my way, just leaving now in fact. There's no trouble with the flight, is there? Good. Actually, we conned some moron who's back in Japan into watching her for free. Uh-huh."

"Hey," Jin protested, frowning. He hunched down a little in his chair as if that would help hide him from whoever Yamapi was talking to. Any mutual work acquaintance of theirs was not likely to remember Jin fondly.

"Okay, fine, if you insist." Yamapi sighed and hung up.

"Who was that?" Jin asked suspiciously. The alarm grew when Yamapi aimed his phone at Jin and snapped a picture. "What's that supposed to be, my mug shot?" 

Almost immediately, Yamapi's phone alerted him of a new email. "Ryo says you're as ugly as ever and you owe him money with three years' interest," he conveyed.

Relief washed over him before it was burned up by outrage. "Oh, I've got a message for him then."

"Not in front of my daughter," Yamapi said patiently—and knowingly, as Jin aborted making his rude gesture. Once he finished with his shoes, Raimu slid out of her chair to bring him his briefcase. Jin almost whimpered with how cute she was, and even Yamapi looked kind of sweet when he ruffled her hair and leaned over so she could peck him on the cheek. "Thanks for watching her for us, Jin." He had on a big, dumb grin that Jin couldn't bring himself to make fun of.

"Hey, when a friend needs a favor..."

"Yeah, you're welcome. We're not even charging you rent while you get over your 'artistic slump'." His smile faded a bit as he glanced down where Jin had dropped his bag. "Make yourself at home and all that, but is this everything you brought?"

Jin shrugged and fiddled with his spoon. "I wasn't exactly living in a high rise condo in LA. Starving artist, you know. Fu—freaking bohemian and everything."

Yamapi shook his head wonderingly. "Being able to pack up and leave just like that. I guess it suits you."

"Yeah?" He perked up. Pfft, who cared about Rosa. She was a nag, didn't like children, couldn't cook. Terrible marriage prospect. It never would have worked. "I like my freedom."

"You like attention." Yamapi looked like he was about to say more, then thought better of it. He gave his head a small shake. "So I should be back by Wednesday. Keiko might arrive sooner depending on how filming goes."

Jin wondered if there was a correlation between being successful and being secretive. "Where's the movie being shot?"

"New Zealand."

"I should've been an actor."

Yamapi looked at him very pityingly. "You couldn't act your way out of a cardboard box."

"Neither could you."

"True fact. You know who can, though?"

_No_ , Jin thought with a ballooning sense of dread and sent Yamapi murderous telepathic vibes to not go there at any cost.

"My wife."

A whoosh of relief. Jin sagged. Then scowled. "This conversation is retarded. Go catch your plane before I'm stuck with you."

Yamapi kissed Raimu goodbye, and then audaciously blew Jin a kiss too because he was a freak like that. Jin fell out of the chair pretending to gag his brains out.

♥ || ♠

When Jin asked Raimu what she wanted to do with her newfound freedom no longer under her father's oppressive regime (in more or less those words), her immediate answer was: "Disneyland!" And so, hell, Yamapi had left him with spending money, Disneyland it was. Jin stashed things like bottles of water, sunscreen, and towels into a backpack, pulled a cap on over his head, took Raimu by her tiny hand, and hopped on the train.

The usual crush of people was pretty bad at first, but later on Jin managed to get a seat and hold Raimu safe in his lap. She wasn't a very chatty child, but when she had something she wanted to say or something she wanted him to do then she didn't hesitate. At first she wanted him to braid her hair—"the way mommy does it." This was very nearly a disaster as Jin quickly realized that the way mommy did it was also the complicated way that seemed to involve twice as many hands and/or professional technique that all girls must be born with. He couldn't even manage a respectable normal braid. He could do pigtails though, the cute, bouncy kind that sprouted from high up on either side of the head, and even that was a process of aligning them just right so they weren't lopsided. For anyone else's sake this would have been insane, but by God Raimu was going to have the straightest pigtails in all of Disneyland if he had to retie them a gazillion times.

By the time they reached the resort Jin was a self-proclaimed pigtail-tying master. Raimu's hair bounced and swayed eagerly as they crossed the pavement towards the ticket booth. Once inside the park she went still, eyes huge, a little girl overwhelmed by an immense world. Then Jin hoisted her up onto his shoulders and she erupted into delighted giggles.

"I can see Cinderella's Castle!" she exclaimed from her perch. Her hands were considerately placed on top of Jin's head, neither yanking his hair nor getting all over his face.

"Really? Where?" He could see it towering in the distance; it was pretty hard to miss. "Ah, over here?" He started walking in the opposite direction.

"No, no! That way!"

"Which way?"

"That way!" Raimu shrieked happily as he finally ambled in the right direction, carrying the princess onward towards her dreams.

There were rides and shows and more junk food than even Jin knew what to do with. Yamapi had said something about not spoiling her too much but house rules didn't apply to theme parks. Candy and caramel popcorn were the order of the day. Jin began stocking his iPhone with pictures of Raimu sticking her tongue out while brandishing a soft serve cone, posing with every character actor they came across, and tossing a coin into the wishing well at Minnie's House. There was also a minute-and-a-half video of her perched on the back of a prancing white horse, bobbing up and down along to the cheery carousel theme.

"Having fun?"

"Yeah!" Her heels kicked the sides of her mount and she gave a great big grin.

"Say hi to your daddy."

Raimu giggled and waved, the camera zooming in on puckered lips to pass along a kiss: "chu!" Then it swiveled around to show Jin, or at least a portion of his face. "Wish you were here. Not." He smirked and waggled his fingers. "Ciao." 

It was a while later as they were browsing the Kingdom Treasures shop that Jin got Yamapi's text reply: "I hope you drop dead from her cute, usurper."

"LONG LIVE THE NEW KING," he sent back and pocketed his phone. 

They were standing in front of several long, long shelves—more of a wall that spanned one end of the store to the other—featuring rows upon rows of Disney character plush toys. Raimu had walked up and down the entire length, considering each one. They came in various sizes: small, medium, large, and enormous. On her second pass-over she lingered in front of Minnie and almost seemed decided when a voice made her head turn.

Just some dorky-looking high school guy with his girlfriend; he was holding up Donald and saying something in that near-incomprehensible duck speech. The girl laughed and playfully smacked him. Encouraged, he went on with the lame imitation.

Emphasis on lame, and Jin tore his gaze away while swallowing the inexplicable lump in his throat. _Stupid_ , he told himself. Just dumb ancient history. All of a sudden Jin wanted to leave.

He couldn't, because Raimu was blocking his way with a medium-sized Daisy and quizzical eyes. Jin mentally kicked himself and pasted on a smile, but that only increased her visible alarm. Okay, so even small children could read him like a picture book. Plan B was to snatch the plush doll out of her hands and stuff it back on the shelf, then stretch up on his toes to snag the enormous version and plop it in her waiting arms.

Her eyes went wide and shiny with an unspoken, _Really??_

The smile came more readily now as he steered her towards the cash register. She could barely see past Daisy's huge head.

"Thank you," Raimu said as they exited the shop, smiling angelically with her chubby cheek smooshed against padded felt, hugging her prize. Another picture was sent to Yamapi with the message: "replacing u in her ♥ 1 ginormous toy at a time."

Twenty-odd minutes later he received back: "AWWWWW!!"

Followed by: "But I've gotten her like 50 toys."

Jin retaliated with a picture of Raimu wearing the iconic Mouse ears (Minnie version, naturally, with the bow) and: "WELL I DO HER HAIR."

♥ || ♠

Long lines, apparently, could make even sweet little girls cranky. The last word Raimu had deigned to utter to him five minutes ago had been a curt and sullen, "No," when he asked if she wanted to find something else to do. Thus far that one little dismissal had been the worst thing she'd ever said to him and Jin fell into a bit of a sulk himself. He suspected she was in need of a nap which sounded like the best idea in the whole world to him, but the stubborn way she clung to the fence where they waited in line for Alice's Tea Party warned him not to push it. If it had been him, and his parents were trying to drag him off for his own good, he'd pitch one hell of a fit. He probably would have done just that in the past if his mom had ever taken him and his brother to Disneyland.

...But that was a pointless thought, and he pushed it out of his mind. Fairytales were well and good for Fantasyland, and for little girls dreaming of dashing princes on white horses. 

Raimu swung back and forth, hands curled around the iron bars as she watched the cups spin round and round. With any luck the ride would tire her out. Then Jin could worry about how to carry a sleepy child and her giant plush doll back to the apartment. Maybe he should have gotten her something that would fit in the backpack instead—but no, the huge toy he was stuck toting around made her happy.

For now he was bored. Switching Daisy to the other arm he fished his phone out of his pocket, inspired to send his friend another obnoxious text. Never mind Yamapi hadn't responded to last one and was probably holed up in a boring meeting or whatever he did in that fancy suit. Schmoozed. Played golf. Smoked imported cigars. 

Maybe Jin could give the "being successful" thing a go. Not that he wasn't happy with "doing whatever the fuck I want" but success was more likely to involve sexy cars and stunning supermodels. Besides, because of his slump he hadn't done any composing in weeks. 

He nearly dropped his phone when someone bumped his arm.

"Oh, I'm sorry, excuse me." The woman ducked her head briefly, embarrassed smile turning up the corners of her mouth. Young, early- to mid-twenties, wearing casual clothes and light, natural-looking makeup; refreshingly attractive. 

Jin slipped his phone back inside the wide pocket of his hoodie. "No harm done. But cutting in line, I don't know about that." Teasing rather than accusing, and it came easily. But he also noticed there was no one else with her. Who the hell rode spinning teacups all by themselves?

She laughed and rested a hand on the rail. "I'm not in line. I just wanted to be able to see my kids. I told them there was no way I was getting on those with them."

Jin's eyebrows flew up. "Kids?"

The look she sent him was both knowing and long-suffering. "I'm older than I look."

"And how old is that?" He took the bait, checking her hand in a glance. No ring.

This time she smirked, "I'll leave that up to your imagination." She then took notice of Raimu; the little girl stared back with reproach, apparently still stewing in her temper. "Yours?" she asked Jin.

"For time being. I've kidnapped her for a while." Before Jin could feel awkward about his choice of words paired with Raimu's total disregard of him, she decided she was done ignoring him and went to cling to his leg. Jin internally praised her sense of timing and tugged one of her pigtails.

The woman laughed—it had a startled sound but her eyes crinkled with mirth. "Cute. Mine are over there, the boys trying their best to make themselves sick." She rolled her eyes and emphasized _boys_.

Jin surveyed the dizzy array of brightly-colored teacups and found a pair of young boys. The older one was turning the wheel with manic, single-minded intensity while the younger had given up and was just clinging to the edge of the cup, alternatively exhilarated and green around the gills. If he puked like that the mess would go absolutely everywhere. _Eeeeww,_ Jin thought, half-dreading and half-hoping it would happen.

"So what's your name, sweetie?" She was addressing Raimu, not him. Jin was almost offended, but while he knew he wasn't too shabby he had nothing on adorable little girls.

Raimu didn't answer, she just hugged Jin's leg some more. He should probably scold her for being rude but she was cute like that, damnit. Besides, he wasn't her dad. He was like the really cool, favorite uncle. Except not old. Yamapi had tried to tell her Jin was older than him, but the fact was met with all the magnificent distrust a five-year-old could muster. _Best_ little girl.

"Looks like you've got a jealous one," the woman said with an amused smile.

Jin could barely contain the warm, fuzzy feelings tickling his insides. He beamed down at Raimu and nudged her. "Come on, Raimu-chan, say hi."

Reluctant, but in the end polite (a credit to her upbringing, not that Jin would ever say so to Yamapi's face), she detached from him and quietly said hello.

"Nice to meet you, Raimu-chan. I'm Mizuki. Say, can you introduce me to your friend here?" Mizuki's gaze lifted to meet Jin's with a conspiring gleam. 

This time Raimu was more forthcoming, at least enough to apprehensively surrender a name. "...Jin-niichan."

"I see. Jin-san seems really nice."

She gave a decisive, pigtail-bouncing nod. 

Mizuki sighed and cast a brief look over her shoulder where the ride was still in full-swing. "Truthfully I've always wanted a girl. You know, to dress up, play with her hair..." Self-consciously, Raimu twirled the tip of one of her pigtails. "Jin-san is very lucky."

Bad mood lifting, Raimu reached up to tug on Daisy. Jin—finding the whole exchange awkwardly endearing—let her have it and she hugged the doll proudly.

"Wow," Mizuki marveled. "He got that for you? Don't let my boys see or they'll get jealous."

Raimu buried her face in the soft plush to hide her smile.

Mizuki reached out to stroke her head. "She really is precious."

"Aa." Jin knew he had a doofy expression on his face. Whatever. It took him a moment to realize the line was moving. "Oh, uh, I guess you better find your kids."

"Right. Of course." She hastily straightened up and peered around to where the exit was.

Someone jostled him. He'd have hardly registered it—and indeed, most people would only notice the jab of a sharp elbow in their ribs—but some instincts never went away. Noticing the deft slip of agile fingers where they didn't belong, for instance. 

Jin moved, but not fast enough. Other skills, it seemed, did deteriorate from disuse. He slapped a hand over his pocket, felt loose fabric where there should have been the distinct outline of his phone, and mouthed a soundless curse. Karma, a bitch? Who knew? Raising his voice he cried, "Thief!"

Heads turned this way and that. A smart pickpocket blended. 

This one wasn't that smart. A ripple spread out through the crowd as someone pushed and shoved through.

"You—" Jin cut off with a choked gurgle in an effort to not blister any innocent ears. "He took my phone!" He bounced on the balls of his feet, watching in agony as the perpetrator got farther and farther away. No one tried to interfere, drawing back in alarm and keeping their kids close. Jin took several aborted steps to give chase, straining forward the way a dog would against a leash.

"Go," Mizuki urged. "I'll keep an eye on Raimu-chan. We'll wait for you here." She reached for Raimu's hand and the little girl accepted it, puzzled but unperturbed.

"Thanks," Jin let out in an explosive burst, backpack sliding down his arm to hit the pavement. "I'll be right back!" And then he was pounding ahead, squeezing through the closing gaps of the crowd. A few people commented on his rudeness and he nearly tripped across a stroller, but he kept the target in his sights.

It was someone small, definitely a kid, marked by a bright orange t-shirt. The figure wove through the throngs of people with practiced ease. Well, Jin wasn't a scrawny boy anymore and hadn't been for a while, but he'd run through plenty of busy streets in his time. Chasing wasn't exactly the same as being chased, it lacked that "OH SHIT, OH SHIT" adrenaline, but the punk had taken his _phone_. It was like, his second most valuable possession, after the obvious. And even if the kid had lifted something relatively useless Jin would still be after him as a matter of pride. Or something. Someone else could psychoanalyze his actions; all he knew was "mine!" with the occasional afterthought of "you fucker!"

A flash of orange veered right towards the Haunted Mansion. Jin gained a couple feet trying to cut him off. The kid broke through the line winding around the perimeter of the mansion and had actually scrambled halfway up the wall before Jin fisted a handful of loose t-shirt and yanked him down in front dozens of confused onlookers. 

"Kids these days," Jin grated out for their benefit with a strained smile. Maybe they'd think he was reining in an out of control sibling, but just in case he got a better grip on a flailing, skinny arm and hauled out of there. "You little shit," he hissed under his breath, panting a bit but not completely winded. He wasn't sure if he should feel pleased or dismayed by the fact.

The barrage of words that came at him was also hushed, but definitely not Japanese. Jin stopped short—they were out of sight of the people in line at least—and got a good look at the pickpocket. He revised his earlier hope: no way could they be mistaken as related. The boy was young, maybe ten at a stretch, with brown skin and a mop of wiry black curls. His dark eyes seemed too big for his face, and part of that had to do with the lean way his skin clung to his bones. Jin's hand was huge where it clamped around a thin wrist. His clothes were dirty and ratty, and the smell—well, it wasn't "I'm a rebel who isn't going to bathe for a day or two because that'll show my parents!" If he even had parents.

Great. Jin sighed heavily and ignored whatever language the kid was gibbering in; he could guess the meaning and interpret the emphatic gestures. All variants of: "I'm innocent! What do you want with me? I wasn't doing anything!" The pleas of the guilty never really changed. The boy tried his damnedest to wriggle free but it wasn't happening.

A familiar word slipped out as Jin searched all his pockets. "Pervert."

"Oh, gross, don't even." Jin snorted and withdrew his hand—now holding his phone, along with a wallet. He kept what was his and flipped the wallet open one-handed, maintaining his stubborn hold on the would-be thief. Credit cards under the name Ichikawa Masayuki, some crumpled receipts, a furtively-creased working girl's card, and several thousand yen. Unhesitatingly, he peeled off a few bills and slapped them into the boy's upturned palm. "Get out of here before security comes after your skinny butt. People like you and— _you_ stand out here." 

He didn't have to say it twice; once Jin let go the kid took off again. Maybe he'd obtain another wallet or another phone on the way out. Telling him it was bad to steal would have been a waste of breath, and turning him over to the cops or what passed for child welfare here... Jin turned his back on the uncomfortable thoughts. Not his problem.

He kept Ichikawa's wallet—to drop off at the Lost and Found later, of course.

♥ || ♠

The recovery of his property hadn't taken long, but the line for the ride had definitely shifted when he got back. Jin followed the trail of people, circling around to the entrance and then to the exit when he didn't see Mizuki or Raimu. Still no sign of them as people poured out of the silly teacups and migrated towards the gate on dizzy feet. Jin spun and stalked around the perimeter again, keeping an eye out for that gigantic Daisy plush, for a single young woman and a little girl in pigtails. And two boys, he remembered as, changing course towards the nearest restroom.

Two boys came out of the building as Jin approached and he stared, unable to recall if the faces were the same, but the younger one did have that pale grimace of just-tossed-all-the-contents-of-my-stomach. They were being led by a squat woman who fussed with wiping their faces with paper towels.

"But moooom..."

Suddenly nauseous himself, Jin looked around but didn't see any other pair of boys of similar ages in sight. No Raimu. No Mizuki.

He dashed back to Alice's Tea Party, stomach churning in a way that had nothing to do with motion sickness. Maybe they'd missed each other. Maybe—or maybe Mizuki had lied about the boys and was one of those crazy, desperate women who stole babies from hospitals. Small children at theme parks were kind of close to that. It was like shopping for the cutest, sweetest kids.

Jin skidded to a halt with his heart thundering, almost blocking out the sound of his name being called over the PA system.

_"Would Akanishi Jin please report to the Main Street House located at the World Bazaar. Again, that is Akanishi Jin, please report to the Main Street House located at the World Bazaar. We have something here that belongs to you."_

♥ || ♠

Jin all but collapsed at the front desk, ignoring the outraged protests from the people in line he'd pushed aside. They could rot. "Where is she?"

The clerk leveled a disapproving frown on him. "Sir, these people have been waiting patiently—"

"Where's Raimu? You called me, I'm here, where is she?"

"Sir," the woman began, but a glance at Jin's face and the way he clung to the front desk—someone would have to pry him off—made her change her mind. Efficiency won over fairness. Huffing, she crisply asked, "Name, please?"

"Akanishi."

Another young woman scurried off to the back room and only then did Jin graciously move aside for the next person in line. He leaned on the desk, drumming his fingers impatiently while trying to tell his heart to calm down. It didn't want to cease its frantic hammering, at least not until the woman came out with her arms full of humongous plush toy and a backpack, but no Raimu.

Then it just stopped. Jin stilled, every inch of him, and as the items were placed on the desk he stared hard at the doorway waiting for a little girl to appear in it. He didn't care if she just materialized, teleported, as long as she had those bouncy, perfectly aligned pigtails. "Wait, what?" He'd missed the first part of what the woman was saying to him.

"Your friend left these things here and said he had to go."

"Friend," Jin repeated, confused. "Mizuki?"

"I'm sorry, the man didn't say his name."

What the hell. "Did he have a little girl with him? What did he look like?"

"No, sir." His alarm must have been catching because her eyes widened. "I—I can't really remember, there wasn't anything that stood out... he was well-dressed, I suppose, for a theme park. Is something wrong?"

_Ffffff—_ Jin grabbed Daisy and turned it all around, but there was nothing unusual or out of place, all the seams were intact. He unzipped the backpack next, rifled through the contents. Nothing missing, but there wasn't anything valuable in it to begin with. Something new, though: a folded sheet of paper that Jin withdrew with trembling fingers.

It was plain white everyday paper, sporting only a couple lines of typeface print.

> We have Raimu-chan. Cooperate and you'll get her back.
> 
> Inform the police and there will be consequences.

"Sir?"

The note offered a date, time, and place. And an amount. Jin shoved it inside the backpack again, zipped the flaps, and slung it over his shoulder. He grabbed Daisy by her big, purple bow. "Thanks," he tossed back on automatic, and pushed his way out of the building.

♥ || ♠

He left Daisy on the train. Originally he meant to take it back to the apartment, but the thought of returning there without Raimu made his conscience squirm with guilt. As if security would see him come in without that little girl clinging to his hand and immediately come down on him with questions. Realistically, of course, they wouldn't notice or suspect a thing. Somehow that was just as bad.

Jin emptied the contents of the backpack on his way to the bank, leaving the junk in a pile of someone else's trash. Then he emptied his account, not that it held much, and the weight of his worth wasn't much heavier than what he'd been carrying before. Second-best thing to useless, then. It covered a bit more than half of the ransom. The kidnappers hadn't asked for a whole lot, not like the millions that splashed across the headlines on TV. You’d think only the rich and affluent ever had their kids held for ransom. Most cases were simply never reported. This one certainly wasn't going to be, and not just because of the threat.

Yamapi could have afforded a couple million, and would have, if Jin said anything. He nervously turned on his phone, half-fearing a call or message from his friend the moment it was on. Jin was a shit actor who couldn't pretend things were fine, although radio silence on his end was probably equally suspicious. Hopefully Yamapi would assume his battery was dead and never have to know a thing. At least not until later.

For now, though, Jin punched in a number. When the other line was picked up he pitched his voice in a wheedling whine, "Hey, Josh. Do me a favor? I'll pay you back..."

It wasn't the first time he'd asked for such favors from certain friends, monetary or otherwise. Occasionally the requests were truly bizarre. No one asked questions; it was usually better not to know.

_Piece of cake_ , Jin thought after making a few more calls and stops, collecting what he needed until the backpack was bulging. Dusk was starting to settle over the city, streetlights blinking on and signs going up in neon. The exchange was noon tomorrow. Jin thought about crashing at a friend's place and wouldn't have hesitated several years ago, but that was several years ago. A lifetime ago. Never mind that it had been the sort of life that went untouched by time, as evidenced by the effortless way he could pick the pieces of it back up. But they were just pieces, not guaranteed to make a whole and he wasn't at all eager to put them together again. He already knew what the picture looked like.

Jin's face was lit by an orange glow as he cupped a hand around the tiny flame under his cigarette. The diamonds on his wrist sparkled. "Damn," he muttered half-heartedly, the word carried along with a plume of smoke. The watch was worth way more than the ransom demanded. He'd sell it in an instant if he needed to, if it meant getting Raimu back. Hell, it'd even be fitting, maybe good for him. But he also could have pawned it anytime in the last four years, particularly when he'd been barely making his rent, and it wasn't as if the thought never occurred to him. He just never went through with it. There was always some other way.

Always other ways. He could come clean to Yamapi, and after Yamapi annihilated him the money would be paid easily. He could disregard the threat and go to the police. He could disregard the ransom and go in alone like a goddamn superhero.

Jin nearly choked on the smoke-bitter laugh that scraped out of his throat. There was something under his skin, close to the surface, a pulse running quick and electric through his veins that wouldn't be ignored. For the first time since he set foot on Japanese soil again he felt at home.

"Jesus-fucking-Christ," he scoffed to himself, at himself, and ground his cigarette out beneath his toe. Some flames were easier to extinguish.

He caught the train back towards the empty, extravagant apartment waiting for him. Figured at least the money would be safest there. Plus, like all the filthy rich, Yamapi kept a well-stocked liquor cabinet.

♥ || ♠

The sun was contrary today, shining down merrily upon Tokyo with nary a cloud in sight. There were probably thousands of people enjoying the warm, early spring weather; housewives throwing windows open and students gazing longingly outside during class. Jin, on the other hand, wished for overcast skies to hide his skulking form as he made his way through winding streets of the shitamachi neighborhood. The buildings here leveled off, no more than a couple stories high, making him feel even more exposed to the sun's watchful, glaring eye.

He wasn't hung-over, that would have been dumb even for him. But he wasn't anything close to well-rested, either. Hitting some of Yamapi's single malt scotch had failed to take the edge off, instead having more of an opposite effect that left him honed and ready for the exchange.

He'd had to ask a friendly old woman for directions but checking his watch he figured he'd be on time. Maybe even early. His fingers tightened on the strap of the backpack digging into his shoulder and he started to jog down the gentle slope of the street.

It wasn't long before Jin found the site without having to check the address. Abandoned auto shop was almost as obvious as abandoned warehouse. Sheets of rusting metal clung like patchwork to the walls of the building, its single garage door graffiti-ed over. _Raimu-chan better not get tetanus in this place, geez._ Jin checked up and down the street, then stepped up to the door and raised the back of his hand to knock.

And froze with his knuckles inches from the door as something thudded behind it. He waited, and the sound came again, sharper, followed by scuffling on the ground. Bending close to put his ear near the door he heard a low curse, another dull thump, and finally nothing. Well, wasn't that curious—and alarming, because Raimu was in there. Jin grabbed the knob, took a steady breath (for Jin that was as much as he ever looked before he leapt), and yanked.

"Oh, shi—!" He yelped and scrambled out of the way. The body hit the ground at his feet; male with floppy bleached hair, and several facial piercings that glinted wetly in an explosion of blood around his nose and mouth. Jin prodded a limp arm with the toe of his boot and it moved—was dragged, rather, back into the building.

Jin's eyes followed the body to a pair of leather-encased hands gripping the unlucky guy's ankles. Up to a flash of lean biceps that disappeared under rolled up dark jacket sleeves, filled out shoulders, mussed black hair. The face was lowered, intent on the task at hand, but Jin could recognize him by his cheekbones for crying loud. By the tips of his fingers peeking out from the fingerless gloves, every other short nail painted black. By the efficient way he yanked and dragged until the body was fully inside along with several other men, some of them groaning and whimpering as they rolled miserably on the dusty auto shop floor.

When Kame straightened up the look he sent Jin was one of sour annoyance. "You're early." He casually stepped on someone's back as he made his way over to Jin.

"What—" was all Jin could get out before Kame's hand covered his mouth. Leather, sweat, and blood flooded Jin's senses, made his breath come fast and his stomach flip-flop. A light push was all that was needed to force him to take a stumbling step backwards, inhaling desperately for air.

Then the door swung shut in his face. The lock clicked as it was turned. Jin blinked disbelievingly at it.

"Hey. Hey!" He jiggled the knob. Kicked the door hard enough to make it rattle on its rusty hinges, but it held. Jin battered on it noisily with his fist. "KAMENASHI, WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?"

No response, of course. Jin tch'ed and went down on one knee in front of the door, fingers slipping into his boot and drawing out the weathered case that held his lock picks. It was a set he made himself from bits of thin road sign metal, making for a colorful array of STOP-red, CAUTION-yellow, and NO TRESPASSING-white. He grinned at his own cleverness even now. This was another skill that hadn't been left by the wayside, as he'd proven last night when he broke into Yamapi's liquor cabinet. And at various other times over the years. It came in handy, all right?

He eyed the lock with an air of disdain. It was a simple pin tumbler as old and worn as the rest of the building; he was mildly offended Kame would even bother. The tension wrench slid into the bottom of the keyhole and Jin applied light pressure in a clockwise direction. Then his short hook pick worked its magic on the pins. Click... click... click... one after another they were raised to shear until all five were set and the cylinder turned, quick and easy. An amateur could have gotten that one, but the electric thrill of success was always a welcome feeling; it kick-started something awake and aware inside him. Jin opened the door again, this time sans falling body.

Kame was still there, crouched down and checking someone's pockets. He didn't look up but commented mildly, "You still keep your picks?"

"Sentimental value," Jin replied, almost flippant as he slipped them back into their case which was then returned to the sheath inside his left boot. The right concealed a different surprise; the kind with three inches of stainless steel. 

"Sentimental." Kame repeated the word, making it flash silver-edged against black matte finish. "Just the word I'd use. In fact it's perfect for someone who's retired."

Jin's lip curled but he grabbed onto his self-control with both hands and held on. Forced his gaze elsewhere, anywhere but Kame. The interior of the shop was much the same as the exterior, rust and graffiti spanning the walls and dust motes swirling in beams of sunlight through chinks in the roof. There was a backdoor. There was an empty office. There were tables shoved up against the walls and overturned buckets to serve as stools. But aside from them, the punks strewn on the floor, and rats and cockroaches nothing else stirred in the building.

Kame spoke up before Jin could give voice to the question and make the truth horribly real. Quieter, claws sheathed, he rifled through a man's wallet without taking anything and said, "She was already gone when I arrived. We're looking."

Jin let out the breath he hadn't known he was holding. "Motherfuck," he bit out succinctly. He began to pace, kicking a guy's legs out of his way, dragging a hand through his hair and tugging as if that would help him think straight. Kame was here. Why was _Kame_ here? Why was Kame _here_? "So—wait, does Yamapi know?"

Kame spared him a withering glance. "You're still in one piece, so no. But after this he might be informed. Besides, he's not stupid and you can't avoid him any longer."

Jin dismissed Kame's accurate reading of his actions with the ease of habit. He also chose to ignore his impending dismemberment at the hands of a wrathful father. His brow furrowed and he self-consciously adjusted the band of his wristwatch when his thoughts snagged on the broader implications. "And how did you guys know? I'm not, like, being monitored am I?" 

Kame's only response to that was icy silence. That was a no, then.

Jin threw the backpack down. He was just getting warmed up. "And last time I checked hide-and-seek wasn't part of paying a ransom. What's the deal here?"

Kame straightened up, crossing his arms over his chest as he turned to Jin with a look that was only half annoyance. There was also a fair amount of disgust, and Jin took an unconscious step back. "Stay out of this, Akanishi. You can't pick and choose. Spare me your guilty baggage and get lost, this doesn't concern you anymore."

"I'm not—"

"Remember how well it went last time?"

Jin blanched. His clenched fists trembled, and he was a nanosecond away from stalking up to Kame and grabbing his lapels and shaking that sneer from his face, softening the hard, disdainful twist of his mouth. In that brief, tangled moment, he wanted to punch him. For a crazed instant he wanted to kiss him. Both were deeply ingrained responses set beneath skin and muscle and into the marrow of his bones.

But with the effect of a tripped alarm, he was warned off. Self-preservation mode kicked him in the ribs and left a bruising ache, reminding him with every blood-swelled thump in his chest. In a jerky motion Jin bent over and snatched up the backpack, slinging it violently over his shoulder. It hit his back but he didn't rise. His eyes were caught on the slightly rounded corner peeking out of a man's shirt pocket. White with a splotch of red.

Jin slid it free and stared at the familiar face card

The King of Hearts. The Suicide King. And looking the part, too.

"Kamenashi," he began. Stuttered. Didn't resist as the card was plucked from his numb fingers. His pads remained dry, no wet residue. The blood hadn't come from any of these louts. " _Kamenashi._ "

Kame didn't seem inclined to grace him with a response. The card disappeared inside his jacket and then he turned to go. Just like that.

Jin grabbed his arm with a hiss that better suited a wounded animal. "Kamenashi. That is my card. You can't tell me I'm not involved—what the fuck is going on?"

Kame didn't try to shake him off, just gave him a baleful, straightforward glare. "Could you be any more of an egoist? Everything isn't always about you—no, shut up, fine. Listen. We've been working on them for months. Whenever we go in for the kill the real players go to ground and we only get the cannon fodder. They know enough about us to leave juvenile taunts so there's been a card at every site." Jin's grip tightened on his wrist, digging into the fine bones there. Kame finally grimaced, reached around the back of Jin's neck as if to caress but instead took him by the scruff and shook. "It's random, you paranoid lunatic. They don't know that much."

Jin let go. He swatted Kame's arm away as an afterthought. "That's still way too much for comfort. And how come you're not a neurotic basketcase over it?"

"Unlike some people, I can cope under pressure."

One jab deserved another. Jin took a swing. Kame clearly expected it; deflected with his open palm and brought the other up in a closed fist. Jin didn't remember him being that fast. Nor did he remember much else after the raised knuckle of Kame's middle finger connected precisely with his temple.


	2. Chapter 2

Jin woke up with his face mashed into Yamapi's couch, drooling on the expensive upholstery, and unable to clearly recall how he got there. He thought he may have been in the backseat of a vehicle for a while—either that or he'd been briefly transported to some other lurching land of balled up food wrappers, stained paper cups, CDs, and other toss-it-in-the-back junk. Some crap playing on the radio had muddled whatever snatches of conversation he blearily caught. And then he'd passed out again, tired and just plain unwilling to deal with the world. He remembered Kame, might have recognized his voice, and could have chalked it up as a tamer than usual nightmare. 

Despite the sleep he supposedly got, Jin felt worse than he had in the morning. Sunrise had seen him through with focused clarity. Now the sun was dipping below the skyline in a haze of burning orange fading into navy, and his entire head pretty much felt like it was stuffed with cotton.

Giving his body's protests the finger he got up and staggered into the kitchen, fumbling the lights on as he went. Brightness flooded his vision white. Jin blinked and squinted through the assault, managing to find a glass and fill it with water without dire mishap. Draining the cold liquid sent a small shock through his system that made him painfully aware of the throb of his head, which was only the beginning of his sorry state. Heavy pounding from the neck up, shriveled emptiness in the gut. What had he eaten in the morning? _Had_ he eaten in the morning?

"I am too old to live like this," Jin groused in disgust. He refilled his glass and opened the refrigerator. Stared blankly at the healthy stock inside. Fresh vegetables and other raw ingredients, not a leftover pizza in sight. Jin wasn't a total animal; he could cook and it wasn't awful, but at the moment he'd sooner gnaw on stalks of celery. Chewing was probably the pinnacle of effort he could currently manage.

He was saved from the celery when he found packets of instant miso in the pantry. "Knew it. Not even you can handle yogurt every morning. And who the hell has time to cook around here?" He tried not to think about cooking dinner with Raimu and tore into the packets with more violence than even starvation necessitated.

A couple servings were enough to make him feel full, at least for time being. He didn't fancy throwing up so he held off on anything more substantial, though part of him wouldn't have minded eating himself into oblivion. He wasn't sure how else he was going to survive the night while lucid.

Nothing on TV could distract him. His phone was on and charging but he hadn't checked his mail. He tried the liquor cabinet and found it newly locked. Then he found his picks were gone. "Kamenashi, you bastard!" Jin very nearly shoved over the entire thing, imagining the satisfying crash and tinkle of glass that would erupt within. He punched the wooden doors but all that did was make the bottles rattle and his fist hurt. With a snarl, he turned his back on the cabinet and slouched there on the floor, legs kicked out. The knife was missing as well, but that didn't bother him as much. It was just a knife. The lock picks—those were his like the fingers on his hands were his. He'd been fucking amputated. 

Jin's head thumped against the wood panels, eyes closed. He could have still gotten in there if he really wanted; all it took was some paper clips, maybe a mutilated pen cap. Too much effort, though, he didn't care anymore. He didn't need his favorite vices, he was totally zen.

In the midst of his novice attempt at meditation he stuck a hand in his pocket, breaking the silence with a chuckle at what he encountered there. Still had his smokes. He lit up where he was sitting and got ash on Yamapi's polished floor, sparing a flippant prayer for no sprinkler to turn on over his head and no fire alarm to scream in his ear.

_Now_ he was zen. Marginally. Close enough. At least the gods of the cancer stick smiled upon him, and he smoked in peace.

The gods of irony, on the other hand, spat in his face, jeered, and kicked him when he was down. All the time. Jin exhaled sweet addiction, and through the wisps of smoke saw the familiar backpack. It was definitely not empty. He knew better, but he still scooted forward until he was sitting cross-legged in front of it, and yanked the zipper open.

"Thanks, Kamenashi," Jin muttered with nicotine-laced sarcasm. "Make off with my blade, my picks, but leave me the money. Really considerate."

Stark white stood out against the muted colors of the stacks of bank notes. Jin snatched the ransom note up and whipped out his lighter vengefully. The corner of the paper blackened and curled, flames licking up its surface and eating away the joke of a message. The typeface words gradually disappeared. He had half a mind to do away with the cash, too, since it was clearly up to him what he did with it.

Jin hissed when the fire had enough of paper and jumped eagerly for his fingers. He dropped what was left of the note, smacking the flames out and doing heinous things to the floor. The really, really nice floor of Yamapi's really, really nice apartment. To Yamapi the ransom would have been a drop in the bucket. They could have asked for millions if the ransom had been intended for him.

Jin's mind went suddenly blank with realization. And then he examined in a rush: his reluctance to let Yamapi know about his screw-up, it masked what should have been obvious, that the ransom had clearly been addressed to Jin. He'd been called to get the note by name. Full name, and he hadn't even introduced himself properly to Mizuki. The amount demanded was approximately as much as he could scrounge together, given the one evening, and operating more or less legally. 

_"Could you be any more of an egoist?"_ Kame sneered at him in memory.

Cross-examination: the kidnappers might not have known Raimu's dad was loaded. Except for the shiny on his wrist Jin's look didn't scream billionaire. The name—maybe Raimu told them.

Redirect: bullshit.

New evidence, regulation be damned: Jin squeezed his eyes shut and saw the card. His card, the way the street sign lock picks were his, customized by his hands alone. His symbol and title, that gruesomely artful splash of blood—

_"They know enough about us to leave juvenile taunts."_

He broke what was left of his cigarette in half. Jin unfolded from his hunched position and climbed deliberately to his feet. He dipped down again briefly to retrieve a wad of cash from the collection and pocket it. His phone, fully charged, joined the money.

He went to the duffle bag that contained pretty much everything else he bothered to keep, not his entire life but three years' worth of something new and supposedly respectable. The sum of it probably spoke for itself. There were mostly clothes, which he pushed aside. A pair of battered sneakers; useless. A notebook bulging with loose pages, music sheets, and uninspired lyrics; he let it fall to the floor with a resounding smack, papers scattering. Finally, his digging hand closed around a Kydex sheath. Because of course he had more than one knife. The Recon Tanto was a seven-inch blade in tactical black, not quite as familiar in his hand as the Camillus Quickdraw Kame had lifted off him, but just as dependable. Unlike the smaller knife Jin had little choice but to carry the impressive Tanto IWB—tucked inside the waistband at about five o'clock, and the sheath was modified with a belt loop to ensure it would stay in place.

Feeling a bit more reassured now, though still sharply aware of the empty space in his left boot, Jin was as ready as he needed to be. He had some personal calls to make.

♥ || ♠

"Well, shit," Jin said to himself inside the elevator car. He pressed the B2 button again to make sure, but the results were the same as the first time. Nothing happened.

What should have happened was the car went down to the lower level. The level that was actually a totally empty lot because there was no ramp leading out of it, like the builders forgot to put it in and left the sub-basement as it was. There wasn't much down there; mostly rats, maybe the occasional person who wound up there accidentally while going to their car. Not many punk kids or homeless people since the sub-basement was only accessible by the elevator or stairs in the hotel.

The stairs were where Jin tried next. "Oh, come on." His feet scuffed across the cement floor at the bottom of the small stairwell, only to stop short in front of the cinderblock wall where a door used to be. He touched his palm to the rough, solid surface, and heaved a sigh.

Well, he'd known it might not still be there. A lot could happen in three and a half years.

Luckily there was Plan B. Jin wasn't too concerned yet as he returned aboveground and breezed out onto the streets, heading in the direction of Kabukicho.

♥ || ♠

Fantasy Girl was just the same as he remembered it, tucked in between buildings with lit-up signs advertising a plethora of schoolgirls. There was a girl standing at the entrance, too, somewhat mismatched in a nurse costume and chunky platform shoes. As soon as she noticed Jin looking she hustled forward to snag his arm, all smiles and compliments and glowing invitations to come inside for a few drink and some company.

He said that he was game. Then it was up the stairs, door on the left, and into a smoky, glam parlor of costumed girls and drunken salary men. Jin didn't bother seeking out a familiar face among the French maids and sailor-suited schoolgirls, not with the turnover rate in these places. What did surprise him was the thirty-something woman with an upswept, bleach-fried hairdo who greeted him with a smiling, bright red mouth. The Madam he recalled from before had been a crow of a woman, laugh lines crinkling when she cackled and more than a little eccentric, nothing like this obsequious replacement.

But this was otherwise the same bar. It was worth a shot. "Actually," Jin interrupted before the Madam could show him to a booth with a parade of hostesses. Her plastic-model grin made him cringe inwardly but he carried on. "I heard I could find someone special here. A girl like diamonds."

"Diamonds?" The woman's penciled eyebrows arched sharply.

"Uh, yeah." Jin stuffed his hands inside his pockets defensively. Stupid codeword. Shit, what if it had changed? He hadn't even thought of that.

But then she was smiling again, less manic and more sly. "Of course. Ai-chan will show you."

A girl sidled up to him decked out in a bunny suit of black satin, mesh pantyhose, and jaunty ears. "Follow the white rabbit," she invited, crooking a finger before presenting her fluffy cottontail and sashaying away.

She led him through a curtain towards the back, as expected. Here the halls were stripped of glamour, wallpaper faded and peeling at the edges, carpet threadbare under the endless trod of heels. A light-limned doorway at one end of the hallway was opened a crack to reveal mirrors and a rack of costumes for the girls. Other doors were closed, and it was one of these that Ai stopped in front of. She twisted the knob and ushered him into...

...the empty room. Well, there was a padded loveseat, a coffee table, a mini bar, and mood music seeping from a pair of speakers. There was Ai pressing up against him, the tips of her long ears wobbling in his face.

Not exactly what he'd been angling for, incidentally.

"Knock it off." He batted the ears away and she untangled from him to straighten her headband with an annoyed pout. "I'm not here for that kind of game."

Eying him now with wariness, the bunny girl minced several steps back on her stilettos. "Then you want another girl because I'm not into the real wacky stuff."

Jin rolled his eyes and tried to ignore the faint alarm bell that went ringing in his head. "I'll pass on that, too." He turned and wrenched the door open, making a sharp turn that brought him to an identical door. A similar set-up lay within. Next room upgraded to a queen-sized bed. He even checked the doorway with a green emergency exit sign overhead, just in case, but the only thing out there was a rusty fire escape. Jin finally stomped over to the last remaining door at the opposite end of the hall. It wasn't locked, and based on the established pattern all he expected was the deluxe platinum fuck room, which was exactly what he found.

It was also occupied. But Jin was barely fazed. "What happened to this place?" he demanded of no one in particular—certainly not the man with the aghast, but familiar face of a TV personality fumbling with his trousers, nor the two girls complaining loudly and making token efforts to cover themselves.

Large hands landed on Jin's shoulders and all but yanked him off his feet. He stumbled backwards and bounced off the wall, suddenly facing two men with mouths that seemed twisted in perpetual sneers. One of them chewed a toothpick; the other wore a pair of shades indoors. Both had the telltale licks and curls of intricate tattoos peeking out from the loose collars of their shirts.

"Wow." Jin blinked. "You know, I think I made a mistake."

Shades cracked his knuckles. "And I think you need some correcting."

Hands in the air in a universal placating gesture, Jin edged slowly towards the emergency exit. "Actually, I got it covered. I'll see myself out now." 

Without waiting for a response he spun and charged down the hall, throwing the exit door open and clattering onto the steel grate platform. It creaked under his weight, then with the added weight of his pursuers. Jin shook his head. Yazuka in Fantasy Girl meant they must own the bar now or they wouldn't have dared to show their ugly mugs, let alone swagger around like that. The Tanto was still secured and hidden beneath his shirt, but it was a last resort. Jin wasn't about to start shit in some gang's territory.

"Come on, guys, no biggie—oops." Jin danced back from the section of railing that broke off when he tried to brace a hand on it. Toothpick careened after him and Jin leapt down the next flight of stairs to avoid being grabbed. His feet hit the platform, causing metal to groan and shudder, but the structure held. Hey, points for construction. He kicked the ladder at the end and it unfolded. Then it snapped off its hinges to clatter on the ground below. Points retracted. "Umm, okay then."

Jin swung over and climbed down the part of the ladder attached to the platform, lowering himself until he was dangling from the last rung and grinning sheepishly at the pair of faces scowling at him from above. "It's been fun, but ciao!" He dropped, almost lost his footing when he landed on the other piece of ladder, and then was sprinting out of the alley to get lost in the crowded street.

♥ || ♠

Three and a half years. It was a relatively small slice of his life, and a period where he deliberately moved away from Japan and all that had happened there. Jin hadn't expected to succeed so well.

Or rather, he hadn't expected everything to move away from him. He tried a handful of other possible locations, hangouts he remembered, but nothing seemed to remain. Just the usual oblivious pack of civilians concentrating intently on the cascade of pinballs in pachinko machines, belting out the latest chart-toppers and golden hits in karaoke rooms, moving in and around the stop-and-go flow in front of food stalls.

Jin angrily shoved ramen into his mouth and bitched aloud around a mouthful of noodles. "How hard can it possibly be to find a super secret organization? It's not even that secret anymore. And it's huge. Like—" He held his hands apart. Considered the amount of space between them. Widened them some more. "—Huge."

Twenty minutes later Jin was still slumped in his seat at the ramen stand, staring at his cup of sake and willing it to reveal the mysteries of life to him. Or at least help him remember one more place to try. He racked his brain for anything but his dead last option.

"Son of a bitch," Jin moaned. He tossed the drink back and reached for his phone. He was pretty sure no one had yet invented a way to murder via mobile, although his lack of knowledge about Yamapi's position in the organization had never worried him more.

He masochistically started entering the number digit by digit instead of hitting speed dial, drawing the process out. Five digits in someone sat down next to him and refilled his cup. Jin happily aborted the call, but it wouldn't do to let on so he hunched his shoulders and dragged his cup close suspiciously.

The man beside him looked to be middle-aged with a fairly unremarkable face, and he didn't quite meet Jin's eyes when he leaned over a tiny bit and said, "Nice work, giving Imagawa and Tojo the slip like that."

"Eh?"

"The fire escape. I'll have to keep that in mind."

Oh, that. Jin looked the stranger over again, noting the expensive but ill-fitting suit that was out of style even in his inexpert assessment. "I wouldn't recommend it. Dangerous, you know."

"Yeah, and so's getting knocked around by some yakuza brutes." 

"That's true." Jin stared down into the clear liquid of his cup, waiting and wondering. The man ordered a bowl of tonkotsu ramen and didn't seem inclined to introduce himself, or say anything further. The minutes stretched out and the conversation withered into a period of silence. Jin grimaced a little but threw out a line to see what it would get him. "You... are a regular there or something?"

"Used to be, I guess. Not as much nowadays." He gave Jin another one of those shifty, almost-glances. "You too?"

"Well..." Jin hedged. He lowered his voice. "Thought I wouldn't need to anymore, but you know how it is." He hoped his grin would be construed as rueful and not pleased with the perfectly true, misleadingly contextualized statement.

Suit nodded and Jin's hopes lifted. "New ownership, new business. Not that the new perks aren't all bad, mind, but—" He was momentarily distracted by the steaming bowl placed in front of him, and Jin curbed his own impatience by sipping his sake. He might finally be getting somewhere. "Sorry," Suit said after slurping up some noodles. He fished around in a pocket and deposited something that clicked on the tabletop. "Here. There's a new club on Dogenzaka called Royal Flush, you can try your luck there. Take the back door and show this to whoever answers it."

Jin swept up the white poker chip with an excited grin. Very, very promising. "Thanks. I mean it, thanks."

"Don't mention it. And I mean that." Suit bent down over his bowl again, mumbling, "Maybe I'll see you around. Maybe not. Good luck."

♥ || ♠

The back entrance to Royal Flush was located in a typically sleazy alley, parked between a love hotel and pub. It was late—not that you could really tell in Shibuya, but Jin had taken the last train to get here and if he struck out again, well, he'd cross that bridge when he came to it. Passing a couple on their way into Hotel Paris next door, Jin strolled up to the club's door and banged on it.

He expected to be confronted with a muscled bouncer of some sort, but the guy who opened the door with a, "Yeah, yeah, what?" was young, skinny, and he regarded Jin with casual disinterest. 

Jin flashed the chip. The guy's look didn't change; he just opened the door wider to let him in. Then he sat down in a nearby folding chair and picked up a PSP to resume a game. "Up the stairs. Second door on the left, new guy," was all he said, kicking his feet up on an overturned crate.

Jin followed the insouciant instructions with a scowl and stung mutter of, "Who the hell's new? I'm a goddamn veteran compared to some punk-ass kid."

A heavy bass pounded from the subterranean club below but the sound and vibrations receded as he went up. He found the second door on the second floor and knocked. Waited. Heard the click of a lock being released and the door was pulled open, then closed and locked again behind him. That was normal, but the soft, ominous sound still made Jin uneasy. 

He was inside what looked to be a VIP lounge, dimly lit along the walls save for a couple brighter overhead lamps. Instead of pleasant music and idle chatter, however, the atmosphere was quiet and tense. Over a dozen men and a few women were seated around three round tables, most of them holding a fan of cards. Some had folded out and watched the games proceed with avid interest. The piles of money in the center of each table were sizable, with more than a few ¥10,000 bills mixed in. The air was thick with cigarette smoke, and ice clinked in numerous glasses. 

"May I get you something to drink while you wait?" The voice belonged to the person who had opened the door—a woman, bronze-skinned and beautiful. Her dark hair was pulled back in a sleek ponytail and she was uniformed in white and black, resuming her position behind the bar's counter. The nameplate pinned to her vest identified her as 'Crystal'.

"Uh. Sure. I'll have a gin and tonic, extra lime." Jin slid onto a stool and battled a sudden onset of self-consciousness. This place was leagues above the little operation he remembered at Fantasy Girl. Digging for his cash, he also pulled out the plain white poker chip that had gotten him in.

"Your G&T, sir."

"One more thing." There was an unopened pack of cards on the counter. Jin swiped it and dumped the contents into his palm, shuffling through them with practiced ease. He selected the King of Hearts and slid it forward. "I'm looking for some friends of mine."

Crystal glanced down at the face card but didn't show any signs of recognition. "I'm sorry, I don't think I can help you."

This was the right place. Had to be. Jin peeled off a few more cards. Ace of Spades, Queen of Spades, Jack of Clubs, Joker.

Still nothing from Crystal.

"Come on," Jin coaxed. "A King needs a Court, you know?"

Crystal's gaze remained lowered—not at the cards, Jin realized, but at the poker chip beneath his tapping finger. When she met his eyes her expression was blank and closed off. "Sorry, no idea."

Enough beating around the bush, Jin was at his limit for subtle games. "Look, it's really, really important. They'll vouch for me. Do you need names, is that—" He suddenly lunged across the bar and grabbed her wrist as it slipped beneath the counter to call security. Bad, bad, bad position to be in. "Um. Sorry. But I gotta talk to these guys."

Crystal glared at him. Her fingers scrabbled at his, trying to break his hold but he had strength on his side.

Then Jin yelped, instantly letting go when she expertly pinched the nerves in his wrist. He heard a door being thrown open from the back. "Seriously? I'm not trying to cause trouble here! I just—"

A hand fisted in his hair. Jin braced himself for an unfriendly collision of nose-meet-bar but instead the grip only tugged—hard—to jerk his head back and threaten his balance. A sidelong glance confirmed all he needed to know and Jin's eyes narrowed. "Kamenashi Liarface Kazuya, you have no idea all the shit I've gone through tonight—"

Kame ignored him and slapped a black chip on the countertop. "This moron was never here."

Crystal took one look at the chip and nodded, no questions asked.

"What?" Jin gaped as Kame yanked on his hair to get him up and moving. "You mean I just had the secret color code wrong? Are you fucking kidding me?" He was alternately pulled and shoved through the door in the back, all but shrieking in frustration. "Quit it with the hair already! What is this, a schoolgirl catfight? And me without my nails done."

Kame pushed him inside a tiny elevator and jabbed the close-doors button. He propped on hand on his hip and pressed the other against his head as if it ached. "I should have let you get tossed out."

Jin rubbed his scalp which did ache quite a bit, spitting out, "I'd have found a way in, it's my goddamn specialty. Speaking of which, I want my picks back, you klepto."

Kame hit the button for the basement level. "You don't need them. What part of 'get lost' don't you understand? Is it the 'get' or the 'lost'?"

"I think it's the part where Raimu-chan gets kidnapped on my watch and my card gets thrown in my face."

"I already told you—"

"Bull. Shit." The basement level light above the door lit up and a thrum of trance music could be heard through the walls. The elevator kept descending where there was no other floor indicator. "Did you identify the blood?"

Kame turned to meet his stare for the first time since he showed up. He had his leader face on, the Court Ace of Spades first and Kamenashi Kazuya second. Maybe even third depending on whether he was in cover mode or not. He probably was; months into a mission there was no way Kame wasn't deep into a thorough investigation. Something about that struck Jin as odd, something weird and atypical concerning Kame's presence, but three years wasn't a negligible gap and Jin had never been the most reasonable when it came to Kame's work. Kame's cool dismissal was in a way familiar, and yeah, there was that old, well-known resentment itching fierce under Jin's skin. "Not yet. And don't get the wrong idea; you're only here because you're less likely to ruin everything if we keep an eye on you."

"Hey, fuck you and the horse you rode in on," Jin snapped. "I don't want to be here either, believe me. It's just that as much as I hate this place, I hate being messed with more. And that includes you for trying to hide it."

The glare Kame shot him was completely black. Jin didn't know what nerve he'd struck—he usually didn't—but fair was fair. He owed Kame a punch, too, but then the elevator finally rolled to a halt. They had to be several stories below the surface.

"Good old Batcave," Jin mock-enthused as the doors slid open to reveal a contrastingly bright hallway. It must be a new complex since they were nowhere near the old one, and just how many sprawling underground facilities could there be beneath Tokyo? The layout was obviously different so he had no choice but to follow Kame's brisk footsteps.

♥ || ♠

CARD. Critical Action Required Division.

"Division of what?" everybody asked at least once, but if there was an answer it wasn't forthcoming.

They weren't cops—far from it, they were pretty much a team of criminals themselves with sins ranging from petty theft to murder. A secretive organization that nonetheless used its powers for good, so to speak. Allies of justice. Crime-hunting vigilantes. The modern ninja. However you wanted to put it, they were a bunch of hypocrites who got results. Where law enforcement failed, CARD succeeded, whether it was merely dragging skeletons out of closets and providing evidence, or taking a more... direct approach. No one was untouchable. That was the only real rule, and the deeper you went into the organization the more you realized it applied to you first and foremost.

The head of the organization was known only as the Dealer. His or her public identity was subject to copious speculation and rumor, most accepting as fact that the person was a) exorbitantly wealthy, and b) fanatically obsessed with a playing card theme.

"Is it just me or is this place bigger than the last one?" Jin was shit at memorizing layouts but he did have a pretty good (or just plain lucky) sense of direction. He'd probably find the elevator again by stumbling across it.

Kame's shoulders lifted in a shrug and he didn't bother facing Jin to say, "We've gotten along fine since you left."

_Jesus._ Jin grit his teeth. He'd always known Kame could hold a grudge but he'd never flaunted one like this before. But of course Kame could turn anything and everything into a weapon. Maybe they could talk it out and get it over with. Clear the air so Jin could think and not get blindsided by rage every time Kame took a shot. But all that came out of Jin's mouth was, "Real nice. Did Ueda teach you how to snipe like that?"

Without missing a beat Kame raised his curled fist, making Jin skip a step to fall out of range, but all he did was hold it there. "He taught me this, too."

"That reminds me, I owe you a concussion."

"You were not concussed, your head's too thick to take any damage."

"Excuse me!" Jin pushed his hair out of the way to show the bruise even though Kame wasn't looking.

"Well, if you want to get it looked at you could visit the doctor." Kame's brief glance gave away nothing but Jin was instantly on guard.

"We have an in-house doc now?"

"Old friend of yours."

Jin's eyes narrowed. He was nearly certain any of his friends would be a disaster of a doctor. Maybe Yamapi, but Yamapi had some other hush-hush job. That guy, Shige? No, he'd been into law so he'd know the ins and outs of all the felonies they were committing. Jin waited, but Kame said nothing more. "Oh, come on!"

"If you want to find out all you need to do is get yourself shot or stabbed. And you're in luck, because some of these guys might be willing to indulge you."

They stopped in front of a door. There was a plaque beside it with a series of white numbers on black background, but no name. Jin could guess, though.

He stepped inside and made an initial sweep of the room, focusing first on Ueda, largely due to the fact he was seated at a table covered in various disassembled guns. The Queen of Spades flicked his gaze up in acknowledgement, and then went back to serenely swabbing a rifle receiver with a Q-tip. Sitting adjacent to Ueda and leaving ample room to not get in the way of the barrel was an unknown, nerdy-looking man typing away on a laptop. There didn't appear to be any violence forthcoming from that quarter.

The center of the room featured a coffee table surrounded by an L-shaped couch and matching armchair. Koki and Taguchi sprawled on the couch, the former with his face covered by a magazine and head bobbing slightly to an unheard tune, the latter immersed in a handheld video game with his leg stretched out in a cast. Both of them ignored the TV mounted on the wall, which was currently displaying a Fanta commercial on mute. Below it were a couple game consoles and a rack of DVDs. Off to the side there was even a tiny kitchenette featuring a microwave, coffeemaker, and mini fridge.

"You've got to be kidding me." Jin stood and gaped at what had to be the Court Suite. Previously it had consisted of little more than a table surrounded by folding chairs, a water cooler, and a whiteboard that featured a faded but obvious depiction of an erect penis in the corner thanks to someone's permanent purple marker.

At the sound of Jin's voice Koki slid the magazine off his face and sat up, removing his earbuds and grinning a shark's grin. "Well, well. Long time no see, Red."

"Shut up, Baldy," Jin shot back on automatic despite the fact that Koki's hair had grown shaggy and dark since last they'd seen each other.

"I think you're in the wrong place," the Court Joker continued, teeth still bared. "Didn't you read the door? This is the _Black_ Suite."

"Clubs and Spades only," Taguchi added in an altogether too chipper tone, bordering on mania. The Jack of Clubs always sounded like that when caught in the middle of a game.

Koki was still getting warmed up. "Maybe those nutjobs in Osaka will take you and your girly Heart. Us, we got no vacancies. Our Court doesn't need two Kings."

Jin swiveled his head to stare at the new guy who tried to hide behind his computer screen. Then he glared back at everyone else who dared to meet his eyes. "What the fuck, you guys. Can we be mature here?"

Kame snorted from behind him. He shoved at the back of Jin's head as he came forward. Again with the bullying! "Even though it's Akanishi, he has a point. Partly since we're going to be babysitting him for time being, and mainly to get up to date ourselves, let's review what we know. Nakamaru?"

"Yes," said the guy behind the laptop, straightening up. "Ah, and I'm Nakamaru Yuichi, King of Clubs in charge of security... and occasionally breaching security."

"He's like an electronic, updated version of you," Koki pointed out.

Jin gave Koki the finger. "Whatever, the clown thinks he's funny. Fill me in on the mission."

"Right." Long fingers tapped a few keys, and then Nakamaru turned the screen around. "We're dealing with a diverse human trafficking network. Women and children coming in mostly from Southeast Asia, some from Latin America and the U.S. The cops are treating them like individual incidents but they're only seeing a potion of the bigger picture. The depressing truth is we haven't learned much more aside from determining the connection. It was the cards that tipped us off."

Several image files had been opened, each one showing a playing card. Random, like Kame said, not limited to just the face cards.

"They're organized and cocky. Hopefully too cocky. Their decision to snatch Yamashita Raimu is something of a wild card. Yamapi has agreed to keep it quiet for now so we'll have more freedom to move, but the moment word gets out things will get volatile."

"The moment he sees my _face_ things will get volatile," Jin corrected with a sinking feeling of doom.

"He's been improving his score at the firing range recently," Ueda deigned to comment while skillfully reassembling a Colt 1911.

"Goodie for him." Jin surveyed at the cards once more, one of a million worries niggling at the back of his mind. The King of Hearts hadn't been added to the collection yet, and none of the ones pictured were bloodstained. "So Raimu-chan was specifically targeted?"

"Well..."

"You're already convinced she was." Kame had his arms crossed, pinning Jin with an intense stare. "Why bother asking?"

"Fine," Jin said tersely, nerves frayed and snapping one by one. "What do _you_ think?"

Kame shrugged. "I agree."

"Well, I—" The huffing tirade Jin had stored up deflated all at once. "Eh?"

Kame made a show of rolling his eyes and sighing extravagantly. "As usual, you only focus on yourself. Did you ever wonder why I was at the site in the first place?"

"I don't know anything about our sources unless they're—ohhh. Gotcha. You could have said something," Jin grumbled. He'd realized already on some level: Kame. Undercover. Right. In that position Kame might've even known about it before it happened, and as soon as the stray thought wandered by Jin's mouth started running away with it. "Shit, you knew. You could have prevented—don't tell me..." The weight of the implication sunk in and left Jin too horrified to finish speaking. Surely, not even for the sake of the mission...?

"What?" Kame challenged, livid and ice-laden. "You're wondering if I was going to use a five-year-old girl as bait?"

Jin flinched, gripping the edge of the table so as to not crawl under it. He may as well have taken one of Ueda's pistols and shot himself in the foot. "No, I mean—sorry."

Kame's gaze dropped him like he wasn't even worth the effort to look at. Every line of his body was taut and strained. "I heard about it too late. They're secretive bastards. I haven't found anything yet to nail the whole operation, just a tip here and there to round up the small-time thugs, save a couple people at a time."

"I know," Jin said in a small, miserable voice. "I know you wouldn't have... I'm sorry."

Kame paused for the smallest of seconds, but the apology was a letter unopened, maybe even thrown away in the trash. Ueda's guns were all assembled now and Kame hopped up to perch on the corner of the cleared table, tension draining from his frame as he began to casually kick his legs. But his tone was all business. "So as I was saying. While it's no surprise word has gotten out about CARD, I'm a bit concerned that specific individuals are being targeted. That's not easy information to come by."

"'No one's untouchable'," Ueda recited. He sighted through the scope of a rifle and aimed. Kame stared down the barrel with a smile full of gallows humor.

"A leak, huh?" Koki crossed his arms behind his head and frowned thoughtfully for a moment, absorbing the possibility. Then with no visible trace of alarm he merely shrugged. "Guess it's kind of inevitable when you think about it."

Jin went cold, downright arctic at the thought of a traitor, suddenly afraid to breathe like it might draw attention. He knew these guys could smell fear. One by one, he looked at each Court member. Indifferent and accepting, all of them, of the possibility they'd have to hunt a comrade. Maybe someone they knew, had trained with, and trusted. When Jin's gaze landed on Kame, the other man narrowed his eyes, daring him to speak aloud what was clawing its way to the front of his mind. He'd jump on whatever pathetic thing came out of Jin's mouth. A roiling sick sensation welled up in Jin's gut, old and familiar, and he choked down the surge of memories.

" _Search and destroy_ ," Taguchi spoke up in an affected robotic voice, as ignorant as ever to an atmosphere. Still parked on the couch, he was too far away to kick, injured leg or no. 

"Eh," Koki said, waving the matter aside. "Plugging leaks sounds like plumber's work. We're the big game hunters."

"Speak for yourself," Nakamaru groaned, turning the laptop back to face him and clicking windows closed. "I'm up to my neck in personnel investigations."

"Yeah," Kame said with a sharp little grin that teased and could hurt only as much as you wanted it to. "Exactly what Koki said: plumber's work."

Nakamaru sighed in long-suffering exasperation. "Oh, screw you assholes."

Jin couldn't have put it better himself.

♥ || ♠

He didn't last another fifteen minutes. The interaction, the banter, it passed over his head. Intentional, for the most part, but at the same time... _"Our Court doesn't need two Kings."_ They called themselves the Black Court now.

"It rolls off the tongue better," Ueda admitted. Finished with the guns he'd started sharpening his knives.

_Fine._ Jin bit back his comments. _I don't want in on your sick little circle-jerk club anyway. Fucking crazy bastards. This entire shithole organization._

They switched back to the topic of the kidnapping ring, but even then Jin barely paid attention. He regretted leaving Yamapi's apartment, reminding himself that he walked here on his own two feet. Had deliberately sought them out. He'd thought... what, exactly? Why turn to CARD?

Because Kame had shown up. And Kame led back to CARD. Easy enough to blame. Kame led back to lots of things; the rush and skid of a chase through back alley mazes, the threat and promise of teeth in the midst of a kiss, the sweat and blood slick of gunmetal warm in his hands. And this deep-seated loathing that turned Jin's stomach.

And Kame wouldn't let him brood by himself. It was like he was attuned to the signal of Jin's misery meter and he couldn't resist cranking it up another notch.

"Akanishi." Only Kame could whip-crack a name like that. "If you can't pay attention, take your moping elsewhere. We're busy."

"You're not the boss of me." Although Jin would have loved to excuse himself, bowing to an order was something he just would not do.

He couldn't keep track of what Kame said next, or what he said in return as part of blinding reflex. Something hummed in the background, and he took it for his own tenuous grip on sanity before a beeping noise interrupted and a buttery scent wafted from the open microwave.

"Popcorn?" Koki snacked on the greasy kernels and offered the bag out. Taguchi stretched to reach it.

"You know what?" Jin finally said, glaring at them all before zeroing in on the only one that mattered. "No, I can't handle it. And yes, I do know my limits. You know them, too, Kamenashi. You fucking know."

He slammed the door behind him as he walked out just to hear it rattle. He would have kicked something over but the hall was clear and immaculately clean. Rote duties like cleaning always fell on the newest recruits, although Jin wondered if CARD was fancy enough now to hire a cleaning crew. Super secret cleaning crew. What would their title be? Elites were Court (Black or Red or Rainbow, what the fuck ever), general support were Dimes, trainees were Deuces...

Jin kicked the wall, dragged the sole of his boot over the pristine paint to leave a smudgy smear of street grime. For a moment he was intensely offended by the whiteness of the walls. Hospitals were allowed to be white. Churches were allowed to be white. Even prisons were better suited for white than this place, buried deep underground where some of Japan's most undesirables ran amok and did what they did best—ruining lives, everyone else's and their own.

A door burst open and a scramble of kids poured out, sweaty and noisy as they elbowed each other in a race to the showers. Deuces from the looks of them; young for one thing, though technically new recruits could come from all walks of life, their expressions (bright and feeling fortunate probably for the first time in their lives) were the most indicative of newbie status. Dimes were a little more aware of the future, a little more ambitious with understanding, particularly those who were sectioned off into their own subgroups. 

The kids froze when they saw Jin, bumping into each other and jostling with their elbows, giving sidelong looks. A rude pack of brats who didn't even duck their heads in greeting before they scuttled off. Their receding whispers and hushed laughter pulled on Jin like a physical thing, a line stretching until it was so thin and tenuous he didn't even notice when it snapped.

He peeked into the room they had vacated. After the surprise of the new and improved Black Suite the sight of a well-kept gym only made him widen his eyes, grudgingly impressed with the high ceiling and polished basketball court. There was a connecting door to the side labeled, "WEIGHTS."

The kids hadn't cleaned up after themselves and would probably catch some hell from a senior later. There were no stands, but the sidelines were littered with thrown-off jackets, bottles of water, snack wrappers, and even someone's shoes.

Jin wandered onto the court and picked up the lone basketball resting there. Dribbled it a couple times just to hear the loud smack echo and fill the cavern. He made a halfhearted attempt to throw the ball and it bounced off the rim, but rather than careen off to the side it came back to his hands. He didn't know what to do with it after that.

♥ || ♠

Kame propped his elbows upon the railing and rubbed his hands over his face, through his hair, and then let his head hang, slumped near the ledge of a rooftop. The neon sign for Royal Flush added a pink tint to his skin. The club remained open all night, as did the card hall. Both places were clean, in spite or maybe because of what they covered. Well, the gambling was certainly illegal, but CARD didn't make a profit from it and cheating wasn't tolerated. No membership fee, no questions, just high stakes, skill, and luck. The bored elite of society loved it, and it was always good to have friends in high places. Information and favors were better earned with loyalty than with threats.

"Well, then," Kame said to himself, turning around to lean back on the railing as he tapped a cigarette out of a pack. The tiny flame of his lighter was a candle against Shibuya's sea of electronic lights. "What to do..."

He shouldn't even be showing his face, not at the club, no matter what time it was. But fuck it, he'd compromised his position the moment he went to the exchange site. There was just no way he could have let Yamapi's daughter get involved, and getting her out would have been worth botching months of work. But he'd been too late, and things had taken an unexpected turn. Jin had a way of warping situations just by existing, like his presence itself was a wrench thrown into the machinations of the universe. Kame's universe, anyway.

"Should have let you get thrown out," he mumbled around his cigarette. "Dumbass." Kame tipped his head back but there wasn't anything to see up above. Just wisps of smoke, then darkness. 

Jin was predictable in a way. Kame knew he'd arrive at the club eventually, would find it if he had to search all of Tokyo by foot. Kame thought maybe by then he'd have figured out what to do. He hadn't.

His phone buzzed in his pocket. He answered it immediately after glancing at the display. "What have you got for me?"

"You're not going to like this." Kusano kept his voice low, tone worried and rushed. He was probably still in the lab.

"Tell me something I don't know, like who's the donor of that sample."

"Right. Well. I triple checked the results to make sure, and it belongs to..."

Kame's cigarette fell from his fingers, scattering ashes and embers as it dropped. His other hand clutched his phone in a white-knuckled grip. "What did you say?"

The door to the rooftop banged open and Jin stood there, recoiling a little once he saw Kame. All the barbs must have done their job if Jin's first reaction was to run away, and Kame wrapped the crushed part of him inside with layers of grim satisfaction and disbelief at the man's _lousy_ timing.

"I can't believe it myself," Kusano said into Kame's ear, "but it's definitely Jin's."

Kame let his anger show. He didn't have any idea who he was angry at and it didn't matter, as long as it was written all over his face and Jin could see it and reach his own conclusions. _WHY?_ he screamed inside his head but all he said aloud was, "Thanks, that'll be all." He managed to end the call without hurling his phone at the ground.

Jin stayed on the roof, kicking the door shut behind him. Kame practically vibrated with everything trying to burst out of him; if he touched the rail now it might shake. For a flash he contemplated jumping over it and scaling down the front of the building. Anything to avoid dealing with Jin. There were some regrets he just couldn't live with.

"Who was that?" Jin asked with that look he got when he'd decided to dig his heels in, come hell or high water.

Inevitability weighed down on Kame's shoulders. He'd known that pushing too hard would come to this, but at the time he'd seen no other way. Jin had a strong sense of self-preservation, and Kame knew where keep poking with the sharp stick, but after a while the pain went numb and there was nothing Kame could do except wait and see which way Jin turned. "No one that concerns you," Kame said in clipped speech, gauging the distance between them and their positions. Jin wasn't going to stand being ignored. They might come to blows.

"Was that the lab?" Jin guessed with awful accuracy. The suspicion in his eyes was heightened by fear.

Kame banked on partial truth. "The blood doesn't belong to Raimu-chan. It's human, but maybe just for show." It showed something all right. And finally a semblance of a plan snapped together in his head. A shoddy plan at best, risky as all hell, but he could improvise as he went. Throwing a few punches with Jin might not be too bad a start.

"Shit." Jin glanced away, relieved but disheartened at the same time. "I guess they wouldn't make it easy, huh."

"Oh? You were under the impression this was going to be easy?" Poke, poke with the stick. Right there at the tender spot. "Did you change your mind these last couple years? Shoot anyone you know recently?" He couldn't look Jin in the eye and say that. Kame focused over Jin's shoulder instead. It was dark enough for him to get away with it, and Jin was reeling so much he wouldn't have noticed the avoidance in broad daylight anyway.

"Kamenashi, you ungrateful—" Jin seethed, betrayed. Kame could practically see smoke rising as pure anger cauterized the raw wounds. He could only think of it as a good thing; feeling anything else would cost too much. Jin's throat worked around a tangled, choking mess of outrage until he finally snarled, "Fine. Pardon me. My fucking fault for thinking you were worth it."

Kame nodded, a single, curt motion, but that was all right. "Good. Then we're even." He had one more Ace up his sleeve. Reaching inside his jacket he withdrew Jin's prized lock picks. Dangled them for show. "Guess you won't need these anymore."

Jin rushed him but he had too much distance to cross. All Kame had to do was flick his wrist, and he thought he heard the delicate, fragile pings of thin metal striking the club's sign as they fell down. It was fucking poetic.

The curled fist burying in his gut, though, that just plain hurt. Kame bent over with a gasp, eyes screwed shut as he mentally swore, _damnit, Jin, I need it to be a little more visible then that._ He grabbed at Jin's hoodie to steady himself, but he didn't have to intentionally slow his reaction; Jin was already twisting one of his lapels in his hand— _geez, and I liked this jacket_ —and he was hissing, "Payback's a bitch."

There it was; a solid connection to his jaw. For a brief instant Kame saw stars that couldn't be found in the sky. Jin hadn't pulled his punch at all. Good. Okay, good. Kame licked the blood that broke through the skin of his lip and dazedly contemplated. Maybe a shiner to go with it?

But Jin released him with a shove. Kame's back hit the railing and he sprawled against it, glowering at Jin from under the fringe of his bangs. He taunted, "What, that's all you got?"

Jin turned away quickly. "Yeah," he said, and there was no mistaking the thickness of his voice. "It's not—forget it. Just fucking forget it."

Kame bit back a groan. He straightened up, never mind the details then, efficiency meant stripping things down anyway, and stalked forward silently. Jin sensed him in time to tense up before Kame placed a hand on his shoulder, spun him a bit, and then struck. 

"Go to sleep for a bit," Kame said, sounding tired himself, and he caught Jin's weight as his eyes rolled up and his body went slack. He noticed without meaning to, both now and the other time, that Jin felt lighter. He might've looked thinner too if he didn't insist on swimming in those huge hoodies. Loss of muscle, Kame reasoned, because he couldn't imagine Jin eating less.

"Why couldn't you stay in America?" he grumbled, attempting to navigate the stairs without breaking either of their necks. "Eating all of that greasy American food, going clubbing with your friends, your girlfriend, kids... I thought you'd have kids by now. You're almost thirty. You aren't going to stay this good-looking forever, moron."

It was only one level down to reach the elevator. Kame ceased his one-sided conversation and let Jin slide to the floor, fixing his gaze on the camera he knew was in the corner. Unlike the other elevator by the side entrance, this one was accessible to the public and needed additional security measures to get below. "Hey," he said to whoever was on duty. "I need to drop this dumbass off at the infirmary." After a beat the car began to descend.

Kame knelt down and rubbed his thumb along Jin's cheek, erasing the telltale moisture with a touch that lingered more than it should have. "Sorry," he allowed himself to say, safe with unconsciousness as a barrier. Even so, there was a small chance Jin would hear it and never remember when he woke up. That would have to be good enough. Just good enough to live with.


	3. Chapter 3

"Why is it you?!" Jin all but screeched, kicking his legs where they'd tangled with the sheets. The lights were too bright and his temples throbbed and everything smelled like disinfectant.

And Tegoshi was standing there in a white lab coat armed with a clipboard and a penlight. "It's been a while, Akanishi-san."

"Please tell me you're playing dress-up. Is Massu a nurse?"

Tegoshi laughed and Jin ground his teeth at the sound. "No, Massu is on security duty tonight. He helped bring you here, though."

Jin managed to free himself and pushed the pile of sheets off the bed just so someone would have to pick them up later. That someone being Tegoshi since it was his infirmary. "You so do not have the degree for this," he hissed accusingly. "You're a quack. I'm not putting my life in your hands."

"Oh, no need to worry!" Tegoshi flipped through the pages attached to his clipboard. "Bumps and bruises aside, you're in good health. But how are you feeling now that you're awake?"

"Fine," Jin snapped. His head ached. He was starving. He checked his watch but only stared blankly at the hands of the display, not knowing at what time he'd been punched out _again_ by Kame. "That son of a—" Jin leapt to his feet, felt his blood rush and vision go blotchy for a moment, and barely avoided tripping on the sheet on his way out.

"Take care of yourself!" Tegoshi called merrily after him.

"This place has gone to hell since I left," Jin declared, forcing his legs to put one foot in front of the other as he made his way down the hall. He didn't even know where he was going. He'd gotten it in his head the last time to wander up to the roof since it had been his favorite place at old building. The new one wasn't as high, but anything would have sufficed to escape the stifling underground. When they were both still Dimes, he and Kame used to—

No, fuck that guy. Jin scowled until his face hurt, wearing a thundercloud for an expression that sent Dimes and Deuces skittering out of his way. He had half a mind to go up to the street and try and find his beloved lock picks, never mind they were probably all bent out of shape by trampling feet and cars. Fallen down a drain, lost and gone forever. Pieces of scrap metal by now.

_"Forget it. Just fucking forget it."_

Jin found himself at a standstill in the hallway. He tipped sideways until his shoulder met the wall and he flattened his back against it, fist thumping dully on the plaster while he slid down until his knees were pulled up in front of him on the floor. He let his head hang, longish hair falling on either side of his face. "What am I doing here?"

He wasn't sure how long he sat there exuding misery. No one else wandered by and that gave him the sour, resentful feeling of being ignored. He'd done this as a kid, too—a lot of them had, many probably still did—when it came down to it CARD was an asylum for the lonely, the maladjusted, and the unfortunate. Relationships were dysfunctional more often than not. Jin's own Court members—ex-members, they would have told him to grow a pair and then they'd have dragged him up by the hair until he shook them off. Those assholes.

"Excuse me?"

Jin registered the skinny legs intersecting his view of the opposite wall. He followed them up along charcoal denims, white button-up, and argyle sweater vest. He recognized the face—that humongous nose at least—of the new King. Right. His nerdy replacement. "What?" came Jin's surly response, and he racked his brain for a name. "Nakamura?"

"Nakamaru, actually." Naka-whatever shifted his laptop briefcase uncomfortably. 

Jin's brain supplied the picture of a timid rabbit taking its chances with an ill-tempered wolf. He sniggered. Then he caught Nakamaru's wary eye and burst into laughter, rolling on the floor and helplessly holding his sides. He was positive he looked absolutely mental, but there just something funny about it. About everything. About his spectacularly wretched life.

"I was just wondering if you were lost," Nakamaru began, but all that did was bring on a fresh wave of hysterics.

Jin thought he might die laughing, he couldn't breathe, saw blackness flash across his vision. Tears streamed down his face. So funny because he was. He was so lost. He'd been lost for ages.

Nakamaru cautioned his way around Jin, sending nervous glances down the hall. "Should I go get Tegoshi?"

"No," Jin gasped, darting a hand out to miss, then twist in Nakamaru's pant cuff. "Oh, Jesus, no, I will kill you. Bring that twerp here and I'll kill you."

Nakamaru looked marginally less alarmed, but no less bewildered. "Are you all right?"

"No." Dizziness made the world spin. He half-expected to go sliding down the linoleum as the floor tilted. Jin's chest heaved as he gulped for air, rolling onto his back and scrubbing at his watering eyes with a sleeve. "...I'm starving. Shit, I haven't had a real meal since I got to Japan."

"Oh." His utterance was a condensed version of: 'I see your bullshit and accept it.' 

Jin was pathetically grateful. This was the way of war heroes; "it's just a flesh wound," and everyone would nod and let the man die brave and dignified. As dignified as sprawling in a hallway with red, puffy eyes could be, anyway. 

"Well, the cafeteria's closed but the vending machines are down this way." A long-fingered hand stuck out above Jin's face. He took it, but did not assist in picking himself up just to see Nakamaru strain for a moment before giving an exasperated eye-roll. "Hey."

"What? No piggyback?"

♥ || ♠

The clock mounted on the wall read 2:45, and despite the lack of windows there was no mistaking the fact that it was still dark out. Only half the cafeteria lights were on, and the kitchens were dark and empty, but nonetheless Jin and Nakamaru weren't the only ones sitting at the long, standardized tables. Jin even recognized a couple of the scattered faces but no one greeted him. He didn't hold it against them; they looked like they'd been through a week of all-nighters and he was more interested in inhaling his curry rice.

Nakamaru nursed a can of hot coffee with his laptop open again in front of him. Judging by appearances he was soon joining the ranks of the caffeinated undead. Jin remembered: _"...up to my neck in personnel investigations."_

"How do you even do that?" he demanded around a mouthful of food. When all he got was confused look he jabbed at the computer with his plastic spoon. "Don't you know what will happen after you find out who—"

Nakamaru flapped his hands and made shushing noises. "Well, what should I do? Leave it alone so we can be sabotaged? I have orders."

"Orders," Jin repeated, pushing the remainder of his food away. It would only curdle in his mouth at this rate.

"Duty," Nakamaru said. "It's part of my job to keep us safe."

Some of them weren't as grateful as others, as Jin was so recently reminded. Nakamaru started to close his laptop but Jin caught it and spun it around to see what was on the screen. 

Bank statements?

"Thoroughly analyzing every member would be impossible," Nakamaru explained in an undertone, narrow shoulders hunched as he leaned over. "Starting with possible motivations is a little more manageable."

"So, money." Fair enough. In spite of the jazzed up compound Jin was willing to bet nobody here got fat paychecks—unless they were Yamapi, but Yamapi had a socially-acceptable skill set and two degrees (in Economics and Business Administration respectively).

"Money's nice and straightforward," Nakamaru agreed.

It couldn't be that easy. So what was more complicated? "Love," Jin said without thinking, and the word immediately turned to ash on his tongue. He backtracked. "I mean..."

"Actually, that one hadn't occurred to me." A smile quirked Nakamaru's mouth. "Seems obvious now. Maybe I don't watch enough movies."

If only it was limited to movies.

"Ah, found you!"

Jin jerked and Nakamaru winced at the loud voice that disturbed the grave quiet of the cafeteria. Taguchi came limping over on a pair of crutches, taking a seat next to Jin and stretching his legs out in the aisle rather than try and maneuver them under the table. His cast was one part get-well messages, one part graffiti, and one part insults. 'Get well soon~ ♥' floated in a speech bubble above a cartoonish bulldog, right next to someone's well-intentioned haiku and an identifiable scribble that looked vaguely perverted if Jin tilted his head right.

"The timing's not bad." Nakamaru looked between Jin and Taguchi, settling on the latter to ask, "Heard anything?"

"Ahh, well... You mean aside from...?"

"What?" Jin said when Taguchi glanced his way. "Hey. Hey, don't ignore me!"

Nakamaru counted off on his fingers. "Motivations for betrayal. First is money, second is love..."

"Third," Taguchi supplied, "is revenge."

Jin nodded along, it sounded reasonable. CARD wasn't exactly his favorite thing these days... "Wait a minute." There was no missing the sidelong looks he was getting. He pointed at himself. "Me?!"

Nakamaru grabbed at Jin's sleeve to keep him from standing up in outrage. "I know, I know, it's just rumors. Sit down, we're in public!"

"Me?" Jin opened and closed his mouth but no other word would come out. "Me?"

"People don't walk away from CARD every day!" Taguchi said with far too much cheer. "In fact, you're the only one. And from the Court, to boot. Who wouldn't think it's suspicious?"

"Not," Nakamaru added hastily, "that we suspect you. Like I said, it's just a rumor."

"Come on," Jin whined. "Revenge, me? This isn't actually a movie, you know. That doesn't even make any sense."

"Although I do kinda get the feeling there's a grudge—ow!" Taguchi rubbed his good leg.

"Wanna break the other one?" Jin threatened with his fist, glancing down again at the cast. "How the hell did that happen, anyway?"

"I fell." Jin raised his fist again. "From the second storey! It was the only escape route."

"Too bad you didn't have a fire escape," Jin said with a certain degree of smugness.

"Anyway—" 

Whatever Nakamaru was about to say was interrupted by the boom of a door bouncing off the wall. Heads turned and spectators watched avidly as Koki stormed up to the table. His hands hit the surface with a clatter of rings. He glared first at Jin like it was a matter of course, then growled at the rest of them. "Kame's gone. He took Takumi's bike."

"Hah?" Jin said in the ensuing silence, earning Koki's ire again.

"Let's take this someplace else," Nakamaru suggested, closing his laptop and packing it away before Koki flipped a table.

Jin choked when the back of his collar was rudely grabbed. "You, too," Koki said and began dragging him along.

"I get it! I was coming anyway!"

They returned to the privacy of the Black Suite, where Taguchi immediately went to a connecting door and hopped around one-legged inside. The small room was filled with monitors and other electronics. He flipped a few switches and announced, "Oh, good. I can't get a reading on the bike but he has something on his person. Looks like he's in Roppongi."

Koki groaned. "He's suicidal, that's what he is."

"Mm," Taguchi agreed pleasantly. "The Akanishi Effect, maybe?"

"Aw, hell."

"Don't talk like I'm not here!" Jin turned to Nakamaru, the only sane person it seemed in the whole goddamn organization. "What's going on?"

"Yes, yes, sit down, we'll explain."

Jin pulled out a chair and sat. Then he bolted up again. "Kamenashi's investigation? He's meeting up with them now? Why didn't—why is he alone?"

"His cover's blown." Koki kicked the chair and made it bang against the table. "A waste of the background. It was bitch to put together, but we agreed it was too risky for him to show his face again after he got involved in the business with Raimu-chan. Can't believe a careful bastard like him is doing this."

"What are we waiting for? He needs backup." It slipped Jin's mind that minutes ago he hadn't cared whether Kame dug his own grave, and by the time he remembered it was too late to take back. Force of habit; Jin was always Kame's backup. They'd always functioned best as a pair in the field. Kame was the public face while Jin did the sneaking in the background. And that was why Kame's presence at the club had raised a flag on Jin's radar; he never risked revealing a connection back to CARD, especially when he was supposed to be somebody else.

"And who do you think you are?" Koki scoffed. "You folded out, remember?"

Bitch. Jin sunk a hand into his pocket and dug out the white poker chip that had gotten him here. He smacked it on Koki's forehead. "I'm in for this round, assface."

Koki knocked Jin's arm away, the downward turn on his mouth was unimpressed. "Shithead."

"Cockmuncher."

" _You guys._ " Nakamaru cleared his throat. "I have the address."

"Give it to me," Jin and Koki said in unison. 

"Jinx," Jin added triumphantly after. He stuck his tongue out when Koki saluted him with the skull ring on his middle finger.

Nakamaru diplomatically wrote the address twice on two scraps of paper so they wouldn't rip the one in half. "Take the Suzuki," he advised.

Koki frowned. "Akanishi can get his own wheels, I'm not driving him. Bike's faster." 

"Kame may not be the only one you're picking up."

Understanding put Koki's face in business mode. He gave a sharp nod. "Then I'll be back later."

Jin dogged Koki all the way to the garage where an assortment of vehicles was kept. There were rusty old clunkers alongside state of the art machines, motorcycles and box trucks, a limo. A ride for every occasion. Ueda stood waiting for them beside a black Suzuki Wagon R.

"You left some things in the infirmary," he said, handing over Jin's phone and knife. "I'm not going, but take this too just in case."

Jin took one look at the Beretta Px4 Storm Subcompact in Ueda's hand and his insides twisted up around a pained sort of amusement. The two of them used to argue over which was better, the classic Colt 1911 or its upstart rival, the Beretta 92. Jin mostly just shot his mouth off, his only defense being that the M9 had officially replaced the M1911 in the U.S. military so _duh_. The fights always ended the same; they'd wind up at the shooting range. Jin routinely lost, but he thought it was unfair to begin with if the opponent was a trained assassin and Jin himself had no aim to speak of. Although it didn't take skill to shoot at point-blank, close enough to see the bullet explode out someone's head along with spatters of blood and gray meat.

His nose recalled the flinty gun smoke and rancid fear of that time. Taking a shaky breath to clear the grisly flashback, Jin reached out and pushed the gun away. "Thanks," he said through the tightening in his throat. "But I'm good."

Ueda's lips pursed and he tucked a lock of hair behind his ear before taking aim at Jin with just a look. "Some regrets are harder to live with than others." Before Jin could say anything his shirt was lifted and the gun in its holster was tucked inside his waistband opposite of the Recon Tanto.

"Hurry up," Koki called from the driver's seat of the Suzuki.

Ueda gave Jin a shove forward, then flailed his arm in a wave. "Bye-bye."

As they drove up through the long, sloping tunnel to the surface, Jin fiddled with the concealed bulges pressed against his sides. He considered tossing the Beretta in the back, not like Koki would stop him, but by the time the road leveled off and the city sprang up around them all he'd done was rearrange the holsters so they were more evenly balanced. 

The part of him that had no clue what he was doing finally gave up and turned control over to the part that did. At some point during the ride his leg started to bounce a nervous, excited rhythm. Touch memory buzzed along his skin, waiting for the hand to come down on his knee and squeeze, but of course it never landed. Kame wasn't beside him and that—that was suddenly flat-out weird. And unacceptable. Jin was still pissed at him, but he wanted to be pissed at him in person. 

Mori Tower was looming up above when Taguchi radioed them with an urgent update. "Ow!" Jin's head knocked against the window as Koki jerked the car around in an illegal U-turn and floored it towards Toshima.

♥ || ♠

Shinohara Takumi, age twenty-six, blood type AB. Investigation would disclose that he used his real name although he also was listed under numerous aliases. Takumi was first reported missing when he was twelve years old, only to resurface nine years later when indicted (but not convicted) of forgery and fraud. In the underworld he had connections with an organized crime syndicate in the U.K., frequently cooperating with the yakuza in trafficking drugs, and occasionally people, in and out of Japan. A deeper look into his background would reveal he was employed by the same man who had kidnapped him years before, and for all intents and purposes remained loyal. It wasn't, therefore, a stretch to think he would have an interest in merchandise that catered to his boss's presumed tastes.

It sounded good enough in Kame's head. He'd have to ad-lib the rest as he went.

The imported MV Agusta cruised through Roppongi Hills, flashy enough to catch the eyes of those it passed. Not exactly ideal for covert business, but Takumi had a penchant for luxury brands. He always had the bike watched if he had to leave it out, with strictly enforced orders not to touch it and an uncanny way of knowing when it had been. The fifth man who'd tried had all five fingers broken, and no others had dared since. Although the trick wouldn't work so well now that Kame had stripped the bike of its touch sensor and other suspicious equipment in the likely event it was searched. The GPS chip hidden in his earring was a risk as well as an assurance that in the worst case scenario at least the Court would know where he last was. They'd probably notice his absence at headquarters soon.

Kame pulled up in front of a building and ripped his helmet off, tossing it at a surprised valet. A check in the bike's mirror confirmed that the touches of makeup hadn't been smudged, giving the appearance of other scrapes and abrasions to accompany the purple bruise splotching his jaw. Kame was pleased with the effect but Takumi wasn't, and let his displeasure show with narrowed eyes and succinct swearing in English. He smoothed his hair and fussed a bit over the injuries before giving the valet the usual warning about damage or tampering with the MV Agusta. Had to stick with routine, even though the bike would probably be taken apart this time. Koki was going to be devastated.

It was late even by Roppongi standards and near closing time for the entertainment establishments, but the doorman knew Takumi and let him in. La Vita Dolce was a high-end bar to begin with located on the tenth floor, but Takumi went straight to the VIP room. No one stopped him, a tentative good sign, but he felt eyes and cameras watching his back. Those were only to be expected.

Two crisp knocks preceded his opening of the door. Normally a selection of jazz that Takumi liked would be playing, but tonight it was Japanese oldies. His guard went up a little.

"Takumi-kun," greeted the sole occupant of the room. Yamada Shoji, forty-two, representative officer of the Ando group that Takumi had recently begun negotiating with. When questioned why he chose the Ando group he said it was because of the ¥2,500 black Treasurer slims their representative had offered him upon meeting. A still-smoking cigarette balanced on a crystal ashtray by the window that showcased a spectacular view of the district. Yamada invited him inside but did not offer a drink or smoke. "I've been worried about you," he said in placid tones, gaze lingering on Takumi's cuts and bruises.

Takumi was in a rare temper but his speech remained unfailingly polite. "Yamada-san, good evening. I apologize for my appearance and the late hour."

"No matter, but I admit to some surprise. Care to alleviate my curiosity?"

"Why a ransom?" Takumi asked straightaway instead, not caring at all to explain himself the way an underling would. In business he was an equal.

"I'm sorry," Yamada said smoothly. "I'm embarrassed to say some of our younger hotheads got out of hand. I assume they wanted to make some convenient money. Of course we are taking responsibility for their actions. I didn't think you'd be concerned over something as small as that, so much as to personally go to the site."

Time to watch his step. Takumi met Yamada's gaze levelly. "I assumed you'd read the special request list I submitted."

Yamada showed nothing outwardly, though he did give pause before saying, "Ah. Perhaps some miscommunication has occurred. I was not aware of such a list."

"My own oversight," Takumi demurred. "Going forward I'll specifically inform you of unique commissions."

"Yes, that would be best. Then you're interested in our accidental acquisition?"

_Accidental, my foot._ "I noticed the ransom didn't go through."

"So you did." Yamada wasn't budging anymore on that front. 

Switching angles, Takumi introduced his wild card, "I also noticed someone else taking an interest."

Yamada lifted a heavy brow. "More than noticed from the looks of it."

"Very difficult to miss," Takumi admitted, bitterly tracing the bruise marring his skin. "Their reputation precedes them, and I'm beginning to wonder if the Ando group is taking appropriate measures."

"I think after today, you should be more worried about yourself." The warning was spoken lightly, not yet a direct threat, but it was followed up by: "Takumi-kun, are you a gambling man?"

"I wouldn't label myself as such, no."

"I suppose not. Some think you'd be the type." Yamada withdrew a black aluminum case and extended it towards Takumi. "Care for a smoke?"

So far, so good. Takumi accepted one of the gold-tipped cigarettes with a haughty air of 'about time.'

"About your special request," Yamada began after a moment's peace. "Had I known I'd have brought this up before, but we do have some merchandise that may suit your client. If you're free, would you like to take a look?"

Takumi certainly would.

They took Yamada's Cadillac—no doubt the MV Agusta was reduced to parts by now, and Takumi sighed inwardly but let the loss go. An acceptable casualty. The kind he could live with.

There wasn't much traffic at this hour, and in no time Takumi was slamming the car door shut and standing before an Ando-owned pawn shop in Ikebukuro. The store was dark and the sign said 'Closed', but Yamada had called ahead and a man came forward to let them inside. Handbags and shoes lined the shelves, keyboards and guitars were propped on the walls, racks of clothes crowded the floor. Behind the counter was a curtain and a narrow staircase. The three of them went up in single file, Yamada leading with Takumi next and the third man closing in at the back.

Within the locked room at the top, yellow lamplight illuminated a cramped living space; a twin-sized bed shoved in the corner, a TV, a two-burner stove, a mini-fridge. There was a haphazard circle of men sitting around a table where they played a game of Texas hold 'em. The pot consisted of crumpled bills, a few rings, an antique pocket watch, and a set of cat's eye aquamarine cufflinks.

Takumi heard the door close and lock behind him as the players showed their hands. Some were very close in value as was often the case in the game; the winner's hand was three of a kind with Ace and King kickers.

There was something to be said about irony here.

Takumi barely had time to twitch before he was shoved against the wall, head slammed to stun him so his arms could be wrenched back. Someone else removed the slim-frame Glock 36 from its shoulder holster inside his jacket.

"Still not a gambling man, Takumi-kun?" Yamada swept up a handful of cards and fanned them out for display.

"Not really." He spat blood from the cut that had reopened on his mouth.

"Or whoever you are." This time said with a slight curl of the lip. The cards fluttered to the floor and Yamada said to the others, "Store him with the goods for tonight, or what's left of it. Double-check the sources that vouched for him. I'm getting some goddamn shut-eye."

Mutters of agreement floated after Yamada's exit but they sharpened to curses once his footsteps receded. Apparently it had been a long night for everyone.

Kame didn't bother to defend himself; once the suspicion reached a certain level there was no changing it. He'd expected this eventually, had hoped for more time but wasn't surprised that they erred on the side of caution. He remained obedient as his wrists were cuffed behind him, ratcheted tightly at the base to ensure he couldn't slip free. A quick search relieved him of the switchblade in his pocket. They didn't scan him for bugs, but they did remove his watch, wallet, and phone. The chip in his earring was left alone.

There was a closet door nearby that matched the rest of the aged dump, but its brass deadbolt was shiny and new. Opening it showed that the wall had been torn down to connect with the room of the building next-door. 

Kame was pushed inside. He stumbled, but stayed on his feet. A single battery-powered lamp in the corner illuminated the space; a low ceiling that would have forced a taller man to stoop a little, no windows, no other exits save for a padlocked trapdoor. There was trash everywhere—snack wrappers, bags of chips, plastic bottles, empty cups of instant noodles. The place reeked of unwashed bodies and waste.

Piles of blankets rustled, and one by one half a dozen dirty, haggard children sat up to blink owlishly at him. None of them looked older than ten or so, and they weren't all that excited to see him. Curious, mostly, maybe a little hopeful at first but the light of expectation dimmed with habit. Most were obviously a long way from home.

On the other side of the door Kame heard the low murmur of voices, the creak of multiple feet on the stairs. A few of the men were leaving, but at least one remained. He tested the cuffs but the keyhole was facing up, and the short chain didn't give him enough mobility to reach it. Not that he had anything to pick the lock with anyway.

_Should have held onto Jin's set..._

Kame bit his lip and the sting of pain cut off a dry laugh. Jin's words came back to him: _"Sentimental value."_

Pathetic. Both of them.

Kame turned his back against the wall and slid down to sit, slouching so his hands rested in the gap. He'd been in similar situations before, even after Jin left. His only concern was he didn't know when the Court would make its move. Hopefully not until he learned more. For now, might as well close his eyes for a bit and see what the morning would bring.

♥ || ♠

"That's it." Jin sat up from where he'd been stretched out across the entire backseat. "I'm not waiting any longer."

"Don't," Koki growled but he'd also been drumming his fingers restlessly against the wheel for the past hour. The Suzuki was parked down the next block from where Kame's signal had stopped moving. They'd checked out the perimeter of the building but didn't dare hang around acting dodgy in the thick of yakuza territory. Furthermore, they'd been ordered not to move for time being. Actual orders from higher up, or Jin would have been inside already. While at the combini to get food he'd also picked up a uniball pen and a spiral planner. Using both the sharp edge and flat surface of his knife he cut and bent the metal clip of the pen cap, as well as a section of wire to create a makeshift tension wrench and rake. He wasn't as tricked out as he would have liked to be but it was adequate.

"Fuck this, I'm going." Jin's hand went to the door handle. It didn't budge. He jiggled it and yanked on it with both hands and a foot braced against the door when it occurred to him: "Did you child safety lock me in?!"

Koki smirked in the rearview mirror. Then he stuck one arm back to fend Jin off from climbing into the front or strangling him from behind. "Oh, come on! Quit being all Nervous Nancy, it's not like Kame doesn't know what he's doing."

" _I_ don't know what Kame's doing!"

"What, does he need your permission?"

"SHUT UP." Jin threw himself backwards and kicked the driver's seat with a vengeance. "Shut up, lemme out!" More kicking. "Lemme out, Baldy, or I break the window." He brandished the impressive seven-inch Tanto. It was a bitch to keep concealed and Kame had harped on him about overcompensating when he bought it, but whatever, it was one badass knife.

Whether it was the threat or the repeated kicks that did it, Koki finally exploded, "God, why are you like this?! Jesus." He punched the unlock mechanism and Jin flew out of the car.

But rather than immediately running off alone he stayed to jerk open the driver's door. "Let's go."

"What?"

"There's only one entrance, you need to distract the guy. Let's go."

With a great roll of his eyes Koki clomped out of his seat and muttered, "The Akanishi Effect."

Jin wanted to hurry, and mentally he was paranoid and frantic, but his motor control didn't feel like his own. He cruised on auto with Koki stalking at his side, the two of them blending with the other punks loitering in the neighborhood. Though the night had been chilly, now the late morning sun was beating down on them and Jin pushed the sleeves of his hoodie up. His t-shirt might have been enough to hide his weapons from the average person who didn't know to look, but he wasn't going to chance it around here.

Koki lightly smacked the back of his hand against Jin's chest to get his attention, then jerked his head at the pawn shop. Jin shrugged and followed him in, for all appearances just happening to step in for a look-see.

The air inside felt a bit muggy—it was probably hell in the summer—and had that musty second-hand smell of thrift stores. The constant cycling din of pachinko machines in the parlor next-door could be heard through the wall. Jin noted the convex mirror in the corner while seeming to get a closer look at the acoustic Gibson mounted on the wall. Only one mirror, facing the counter.

"Hey," Koki said, pitching his voice. He stood below the mirror in front of a rack of questionably-fashionable pumps. "Think Sakura-chan would like these?"

"The hell are you asking me for?" Jin drifted towards the middle of the room.

Koki continued, "I don't know what size to get. Shit. Hey, you." The guy behind the counter looked up from a copy of Shounen Jump. "Yeah, come over here. Let me see... yeah, you might be the same size. Come try these on for me."

"Not on your life, pal."

"Who said anything about lives? How about for ¥1,000? Come _on_ , she still hasn't forgiven me for missing her birthday. I just thought she didn't want to be reminded of her age. Women, you know?"

"You sure she's worth spending the cash on?"

"Part of being stupid in love."

Unbelievably, the guy put his reading material down. "¥1,500. No discount on the shoes."

"Seriously? Awesome!"

"Love sucks, but hey, I'll take your money."

Koki had him in the corner with his back to the counter so he'd have to crane his neck up to look into the mirror. Jin flashed a V-sign for Koki's benefit—and knowing Koki, he'd buy the shoes for his "Sakura-chan" after all. 

He crept behind the counter to slip through the curtain, watching his step on the stairs to minimize creaks. It was slow going and the air grew warmer as he got to the top, emerging in a claustrophobic room. Jin paused, eyes on the sleeping form of a man on the bed. After a long moment of waiting all that happened was the guy letting out a quiet snore. Jin's gaze swept the room from floor to ceiling, but the only other place to go was the closet. The suspiciously locked closet.

Jin hunkered down in front of the door, and while keeping an eye on the sleeper he tapped softly on the panel and put his ear against it. Did he just hear something? Or was it the stupid pachinko machines, the walls were so thin he could still faintly hear them.

Well, ready or not. He slid his tools from his boot and carefully set to work. The pen clip was a little too wide, the wire a little too delicate, and the lock was too damn new, requiring patience and precision. In most other instances Jin was short on both, but when he got a particular idea in his head he could be single-mindedly tenacious.

All he could think about now was that he didn't know what Kame was doing. It had nothing to do with permission as Koki suggested; it was the simple not-knowing that bugged the hell out of him. Not knowing where Kame was, his status, his plans. Maybe the others were used to it, but Jin wasn't supposed to be on this side of the equation. It didn't take advanced mathematics to figure out how things balanced out. He was supposed to be with Kame, the two of them, a team. Jin always knew what Kame was doing because he was the one watching his back. It was his privilege and his place. He said he was in for this round and he was damn well going to play it like he used to, everyone else could just shove off because he was good at what he did.

After what felt like an eternity of jiggling the stupid wire and ignoring the sheen of sweat starting to collect on his face, the pins finally raised all at once in a straight line. Luckily the metal pen clip was sturdy and held up against the extra tension, successfully turning the plug inside the cylinder. Jin breathed out a sigh of victory, nerves singing.

The closet was empty inside, a couple of bare hangers dangling from a rack, and beyond them the wall had a gaping hole in it. Jin ducked through, silently closing the door behind him in case the sleeper woke up or the other guy came upstairs.

The place was a mess even by his standards, and there in the middle of it all, facing him with a most unimpressed, bland stare was Kame.

For a moment Jin wasn't exactly sure what was expected of him. The swell of pride from successfully breaking in deflated as he was left wondering what that look meant. Anger he'd have been ready for. Relief would have been a stretch, but not impossible. This unreadable blank slate, however... oh, whatever. Jin pushed the thought aside with a stubborn set of his jaw as he kneeled down where Kame was sitting. "Someone worked you over good," he said under his breath, taking in the cuts and bruises. Minor hurts, and unless Kame had gotten good enough fool him he wasn't trying to hide any pain.

Kame's lips twitched into a slim smile—what astonished Jin was the genuine amusement, if still a touch sardonic. "Yeah. You. The rest is fake."

Somehow he wasn't surprised. He licked the pad of his thumb and touched it to some dried redness on Kame's brow, smearing the color to show unbroken skin beneath. "You faker."

The amusement fled and Kame shut up tight. Composed once more, he pointedly changed the topic: "The cavalry came early." 

"I bullied them into it."

"You whined until they couldn't take it anymore."

"Same thing." Jin reached for the handcuffs but Kame jerked away.

"No. It will look weird if you loosen them."

At first Jin could only stare, incomprehension then morphing into stunned disbelief. "I'm taking them off. We're leaving."

"Too early for that." Kame frowned and paused, visibly struck by a thought. "This is the second time you've been early. Who knew it would be so inconvenient?" Before Jin could work up an offended response Kame added like a peace offering, "Take the kids."

He expelled the breath that had been building. "Oh, like that won't look weird, either." They'd been the center of attention since Jin came in, wide-eyed stares from all around. Raimu wasn't among them, and Jin tried not to think too much about that. Thought instead of the painfully fearful, yet hopeful faces in front of him. One face did stand out, though. Same matted curls. Same orange shirt. "Maybe the cops or child welfare wouldn't have been so bad after all."

"CARD can take care of it," Kame said, knowingly or unknowingly sparking anger from the section of flint the organization had hardened on Jin's heart.

"I know how CARD takes care of people like that." _People like us._ The scathing retort carved scars on the soft tissue of his throat.

Kame's lips pressed together, keeping the argument at bay and averting his eyes. "Just get them out of here."

Moving onto the next round. "You're coming too."

"I haven't learned anything yet," Kame snapped, throwing up barbed wire defenses along with a glare that had danger signs posted all over it. "And unlike you I know what I'm doing."

"Give me a break, what are you trying to prove? The Court needs its Ace."

"Like it needed its King?"

This had to stop. Jin lunged forward, balling a hand in Kame's jacket and pushing him against the wall. He leaned in until their faces were inches apart. "Don't. Even. Swear to God, Kamenashi, try to distract me and I'll carry you out, you asshole."

Kame's expression went hard and unflinching, almost unreadable again save for the feverish, desperate burn of determination in his eyes. "I didn't come here for nothing."

As far as Jin was concerned Kame was full of shit. "Nothing." Jin repeated, voice gone flat. He let go to fling an arm out wide to encompass the children gathered around them. Smuggled from their homes and families to be threatened, blackmailed, and deceived. "A couple people at a time, you said. That's not nothing."

Kame's throat flexed as he swallowed and a muscle in his jaw tightened, his glare furious but impotent when forced to concede to his own words. He was intensely silent for a long stretch, stubborn for reasons Jin still couldn't wholly grasp but he was learning. Relearning. Recognizing the blink-of-an-instant pleading look right before Kame finally let his head fall back to thump against the wall. Like catching a glimpse of a man drowning. "...I hate you sometimes."

"Only sometimes?" This time Kame didn't resist when Jin reached for the cuffs. Intended to be temporary restraints, they were easy to pick. Once free Kame rotated his shoulders and shook the stiffness from his arms, each wrist circled by furrows in the skin that he massaged distractedly.

"Let me guess," he said in a dry tone while working a couple more kinks out of his neck. "You didn't plan any further than this."

"Eh, shut up." Jin cocked his head thoughtfully towards the door and relayed, "One guy on the other side sleeping, one downstairs." Koki probably had gotten the car ready nearby (and Jin smirked to himself thinking of Koki explaining to HQ about the abrupt change of plans).

"Store's too small to sneak out unnoticed." Kame reached over and suddenly pulled up the layers of Jin's clothes, ignoring his indignant squawk to nod at the knife and gun tucked against his middle. "We could force our way."

Jin yanked his shirt back down and held onto the hem, fingers twisting in the fabric as he thought about the option. "I don't know..." Seemed like a bad idea with half a dozen kids to look after. Seemed like a bad idea no matter how he thought about it; he was a thief, not a fighter. Speaking of which: "Hey, you!" Alert, he snagged a skinny wrist before a hand got close enough to filch anything (and patted himself on the back for his improved reflexes), then shook a finger at the boy from Disneyland. "Fool me once..."

But instead of feigning wide-eyed innocence the boy's expression was fraught with irritation. With a grumble of choppy, impolite words he pointed to Jin's foot—to the lock picks Jin had returned inside his boot—and then to the trapdoor on the floor.

Lighting up, Jin pounced on the padlock with the glee of a five-year-old with a new toy.

"We're not sure where it opens," Kame warned, but agreeably sat back to let Jin work.

Jin paused to listen to the muffled racket of pachinko machines and estimated the length of distance across the floor. "Back room, I'd say." The lock was simple and a bit worn, not too hard to click open with his slapdash tools. Grabbing hold of the latch, he lifted the square door a crack. Nothing but darkness. He raised it a little more, then finally just folded it all the way back. "Can't see a thing."

Someone pattered up to his side; a girl wearing a Hello Kitty smock offered him the battery-powered lamp. Grinning wide, he ruffled her hair and shoved the light into the hole.

The room was tiny, all four walls faintly illuminated, and it was mostly crowded with boxes. A single door offered a way out.

Kame only met Jin's eyes once before he swung his legs into the hole and dropped, catching himself just for a moment on the edge to get some pivot and clear the boxes that were directly below. He landed crouched and balanced on cat feet. Straightening up, the first thing he did was check the door and signal that it was unlocked. They definitely had their escape route. Next, in a move that was pure curiosity he peeled back a box flap and tilted it so Jin could see the contents: cigarette cartons. Kame nonchalantly pocketed one, ignoring Jin's accusing (hypocritical) hiss of: "Klepto!" When he beckoned with a hand Jin tossed the lamp for him to catch and he set it down out of the way.

Kame pushed boxes flush against the walls, clearing the space in the center while Jin sent Koki a quick text telling him to bring the car around to the back of the pachinko parlor. Behind him, the stairs of the pawn shop creaked. Shop Guy came up and barked at Sleeping Guy, waking him with an announcement that it was lunchtime and they were changing shifts.

Jin's pulse picked up on the beat of danger. He was grinning. Some part of him was a helpless spectator while the other part didn't waste any time, and he began lowering the children one by one. They were affected by adrenaline as well, the nearness of escape emboldening them, and once safely below they raided the stores of prizes for candy and whatever trinkets that could be slipped into pockets. Jin caught Kame's eye and mouthed that he was a bad influence. Kame's raised eyebrow was a rejoinder by itself. He didn't attempt to make any of them to stop, and the place was run by cheating, kidnapping yakuza anyway. Hello Kitty Girl sneezed after getting a spritz of perfume in the face, but the quiet sound was covered by the background noise of the machines.

Jin was dangling the second to last kid for Kame to catch when their luck reneged on them. Someone disturbed a box that crashed to the floor, loudly spilling a wave of mix CDs around several pairs of feet. Both Jin and Kame froze with the boy in the middle, unsure whether up or down would be safer. 

The doorknob of the closet jiggled and Jin released. He reached for the last one, his pickpocket friend, but then the person on the other side figured out the door was unlocked and ripped it open.

In a snap decision Jin drew the Beretta, thumbed the safety off and aimed at the silhouette in the doorway. "Don't move—fuck." Too late, the figure dove to the side and out of sight. Jin had to assume he was arming himself. "Get down there," he said, all but pushing the boy into the hole while keeping his gun trained ahead.

For a second he hesitated: follow the others or take care of the man first? Just in case? What was it worth?

His grip faltered, answer enough. Jin took a step backward, catching the lid of the trapdoor with the fingertips of one hand before dropping below. It slammed shut above him as he fell.

The landing jarred him, and by the time his feet hit the floor Kame was already leading the kids out, not having bothered to wait for Jin to catch up but that was probably for the best. After already being caught it was better to be on the move than stay where they could be trapped. Jin eyed the ceiling but the hatch remained shut. He shoved his gun into the wide pocket of his hoodie and took the rearguard, following the escapees through the back of the parlor away from the gaudy aisles of flashing, noisy machines.

The back door opened into an alley, and down at the end the Suzuki waited with its engine running. Kame still led the pack, and the way he held himself made it look less like a desperate escape and more like a victory march. Jin's heartbeat drummed loud in his ears.

A gangly boy lingered behind the others, turning with a thin arm half-raised in the air. He had a gap-toothed smile that froze and seemed to fall in slow motion, already wide eyes growing wider. Jin whipped his head around, instinctively flattening against the wall.

He saw the figure coming towards him, arms extended with a pistol in a double-handed grip. Heard the small, sound-suppressed burst. In the same instant Jin had the Beretta out and his finger on the trigger, pulling it firm and sure. His return fire cracked loud in contrast. One echoing explosion, two—damnit, aim!—three. A hit, the man staggered. Jin spared half a second to line up his follow-up shot. Four. _Please, please, please, you fucker, please._ The man went down, dropping his weapon, and that was good enough for Jin.

He turned to make a run for the car, only to skid in heart-stopping shock after a few steps. There were voices, movement, an urge to react, then his mind blanked out and his ears went deaf and all he saw was red on a field of orange.

♥ || ♠

"Thanks," Kame said. "Call me if there's an update."

He left Tegoshi in the infirmary which fully occupied with patients. Most of the children just needed rest and nutrients. They were sleeping for now, and CARD was already getting a start on tracking down their families. If no family could be found, well... there were options. The kids could choose. They always got to choose.

Although, Kame supposed he hadn't been given the option to join per se, having been raised in the organization as far back as he could remember before the memories became patchy and incomprehensible. But he chose to stay, and that amounted to the same thing. As for why, there was no bigger, better world out there for him, nothing he could want for himself. He had this secret place, he had dozens of identities and lives, he had weight to carry. He had a small, sordid world, and he wanted to fight the good fight for its sake.

So he stayed. And when Jin had left for bigger and better, that had been his choice. The best choice, even. But Jin didn't just exercise rights; he abused them, and came skulking back to be abused in turn. Kame felt like he was leading a lamb to slaughter, but instead of being killed the lamb turned killer.

There were things Kame knew he could live with. And he knew what Jin couldn't live with.

He didn't have to pause to think before taking the elevator up to the roof. Instead he thought about what to say. What to do. The possibilities beat themselves senseless on a certainty that he was not equipped fix anything that was broken.

Reaching the top, the afternoon sun momentarily blinded him when he stepped out. Shading and blinking his eyes, he found Jin hunched over the railing. He'd stripped off the hoodie, leaving it in a puddle of yellow at his feet with his knife and gun. A plain black t-shirt clung to a frame that was smaller and thinner than Kame remembered, his slouch was more burdened. New wounds on top of old ones.

Three years ago when he'd left, for all intents to never come back, the memory of Jin that Kame had wanted to hold onto was one where he was careless and carefree. Easily amazed, guileless to a point where you almost believed him when he adamantly insisted, "I don't know how that wallet got in my pocket, sir!" Heart on his sleeve, larger than life. Maybe Jin had been Kame's bigger, better world. Maybe that's why Kame tried so hard to keep him out of this one.

He came to stand beside Jin, back to the rail and elbows propped up on it, saying nothing. There was a nice breeze up here and flyaway hair tickled Kame's cheekbones. Jin's hair had grown long and messy, indicative of his laziness, and the shadow of stubble on his chin had gotten darker and coarser over the few days. To say nothing of the shadows under his eyes. This must have been how Jin felt when he used to pester Kame into eating and sleeping during rare and precious downtime on jobs.

"I really fucked up," Jin opened, burying a hand in his hair and slumping further until his chin was tucked in the crook of his arm.

Kame was silent. If Jin was in any kind of talking mood it was best to let him go uninterrupted. 

"Shit. I." He dragged in a breath, shoulders shuddering with the effort. "I knew it, you know? I'm shit at this. Everything. I can't do it, not like you. You guys. Yeah, I—I resent you for it. Resented. No, I don't know." He curled in on himself even more.

"So leave," Kame said because it was the right thing to say. It wasn't an order; it was opening a door. He'd already battered himself half to death trying to wrestle Jin out, knowing from the very start that the odds weren't in his favor. He'd still had to try. 

"I don't know," Jin repeated, plaintive. "I tried, but—but no one—I'm no good anywhere."

"Don't give me that," Kame rebuked, but not as harshly as he could have. It was a relief, in a way, not wielding double edges for once. "You saved lives today. You did."

"I fucked it up. No—I _know_ ," he cut Kame off with a preemptive glare that was still more self-directed than anything. "It could've happened to anybody. It could have happened differently. I know that. And I know we're not superheroes. But."

Kame had nothing to say to that. How many times had he been in the same position, here on this very rooftop, thinking the same things? Innumerable times, and Kame knew he would do it again. And he'd come here again with his regrets, but they wouldn't destroy him. "But just so you know, he's going to be fine. Tegoshi-kun expects a full recovery."

Jin didn't even respond to the mention of his ages-old nemesis. He just nodded in acknowledgement, treating the boy's survival like a trivial thing. Not caring was his primary defense, a method of self-preservation against caring too much. Never would he mention the man he'd shot, maybe even killed, but Kame didn't doubt it was one more ugly black stain on his conscience. There was nothing Kame could do about that.

He had no Ace in the hole, no bluff at the ready, and he'd long since passed the chance to fold. Really, at this point all he could do was play the board and take what he could get.

"Come on," he said, pushing off and away from the railing. "Let's get out of here."


	4. Chapter 4

Jin recognized this routine; though the directions and address were different he was unsurprised to eventually find himself in Nerima, cutting through a park before arriving at Kame's new apartment. Well, probably not _new_ -new, but new to Jin. Like the one he remembered, this place was a good distance from the headquarters in Shibuya and completely residential. Quiet, calm, even picturesque in a way that for some reason struck Jin as abnormally funny. It was nicer than the old place, so maybe CARD's pay scale had gotten more generous. Or maybe Kame was just good at saving. Probably the latter.

The name plate contained his real name, no false identities here, not even that of his other true face, the Ace of Spades. Here, this one room was for Kamenashi Kazuya only, still there beneath the many facades. He'd even changed clothes at the compound, no longer modeled in the designer labels of Takumi.

Jin had forgotten about this. He hadn't thought or remembered deeply enough. The twinge of guilt was soothed over with amazement, even a touch of smugness, because this—having a separate home, some independent space—had been his doing. So to speak. To give him credit for the idea was a bit much, maybe saying he was the cause was better. There had been a time when Kame didn't seem to have any breaks between assignments, shedding one persona only to assume another and managing to lead the team throughout. It had worn on him terribly in several ways, but Jin had been the first to break, mainly because work was monopolizing Kame and Jin simply wasn't going to stand for that. Place and privilege again.

So he entered Kame's new home with a deep-set sense of entitlement that bullied its way on top of reeling uncertainty and fragmented displacement. Falling backward onto a safety net was the opposite of progress, but he wrapped himself in the relief and familiarity with a stubbornness that got him what he wanted just as many as times as it did not.

The first thing he did was raid Kame's kitchen. It wasn't very well stocked considering how long he'd probably been away, but the refrigerator did yield a six-pack of Kirin. 

"Should have stopped by the combini," Kame sighed after admitting defeat to the sad state of his pantry. 

"Maybe," Jin agreed after discovering some sort of alien organism gestating in a Tupperware container. Horrifyingly fascinated, he peeled the lid back to get a better look at the remains and wondered if he could mail it to Josh. With a note: "Thanks for the cash, please accept this as repayment."

"Throw that out," Kame said snippily, face scrunched in disgust and shifty-eyed with embarrassment. 

"Hey, it was grown in _your_ fridge." Jin tossed the whole thing, container and all. Predictably, Kame bitched at him about recycling. 

They managed to scrounge up a dusty, half-empty tube of Pringles, better than nothing. Armed with beer and chips, Jin parked himself in front of the TV, but of course Kame didn't get any good channels. 

"Well, why pay for it when I'm hardly around?" Kame took a swig of beer and propped his feet up on the coffee table. He'd taken his socks off along with his shoes, and his toes were painted to match his fingernails. "Pick a DVD or something."

"What?" Jin dragged his gaze away from where Kame's ankles disappeared under the cuffs of what was clearly a favorite pair of well-worn jeans. Kame comfortable in his own skin was another thing that memory failed to do justice. Jin swallowed. "Oh. But I don't want to watch anything boring, or weepy chick flicks."

Kame twisted around slightly to kick at him. Jin was prepared for it, catching his leg and—didn't let go, not now that he had an excuse. He drew Kame's foot closer and pressed the curve of his knuckles to the sole, feeling Kame still. It wasn't that Kame was ticklish there, and it wasn't that Jin had a particular fetish, but the light contact was another privilege in itself. One that Jin wasn't certain he'd get away with after all, and he shrunk away from the very likely possibility that Kame didn't want him. His actions hadn't exactly been welcoming these past few days. These past few years if truth be told. Until now, maybe, but all of that was beside the point—no amount of reason could get Jin to keep his hands to himself. 

He stroked from the ball of Kame's foot down to the heel, the lines of his fingers sliding over skin that was surprisingly soft to the touch. Though, maybe not so surprising given the pedicure, and Jin smiled to himself while his thumb skimmed along the stretch of delicate bones connecting to Kame's toes. His hand made an abrupt detour up to the ankle when Kame shifted his heel in Jin's lap, pressing firmly down and—

Oh. Um. The beginnings of a flush rose to Jin's skin, settling warm and not-quite-comfortable as Kame leaned the arch of his foot into the apex of Jin's thighs, making him squirm. "Pervert," he accused with a certain quality of heat. His fingers swept over the bump of Kame's ankle and snuck up under his pant cuff, tickling through the fine hairs of his leg.

"You're just easy," Kame drawled from where he now lounged lengthwise across the couch. His figure was as trim as it had ever been, the sharp jut of bones packed with lean muscle, always stronger than he looked. And he looked healthy these days, Jin observed with a weird and most likely presumptuous stirring of pride, but that steadily diminished in importance compared to a rather different kind of stirring under the pressure of Kame's foot.

"Don't tease," Jin whined, struck by the thought that Kame could keep this up and draw it out and probably even make him come with only this—and he wasn't yet at the point where he didn't care how embarrassing that would be. "Come here," he demanded instead, and there were two ways this could go. Either Kame would refuse and put Jin through his paces, or he'd let Jin get away with murder.

Eyes half-lidded and intent, Kame swung his legs around to slink over to Jin's side with an unspoken dare of, _do you really want that?_

Licks and curls of hunger flared to life in Jin's belly and a trembling need broke free. When the tips of Kame's fingers brushed his lips, tracing the swell and contours of his mouth, a swipe of Jin's tongue invited them in. He wanted; he really, really did.

♥ || ♠

There was a perfectly good bed not two meters away but that was two meters too far. It was a millimeter too far. The couch was where they stayed, Jin wedged up against the armrest with his legs open and one foot braced on the floor, Kame's hand moving inside the front of his pants. Rough strokes, messy, _sofuckinggoodohgod—_

He hadn't realized his mental babbling had spilled into verbal until Kame chuckled warm next to his ear. "You're going to traumatize the neighbors."

Probably a bunch of old people with delicate sensibilities, but who the hell cared. Jin showed just how many damns he gave by palming Kame through everyday cheap denim and squeezing. Kame sagged and undulated into the touch, teeth finding the column of Jin's neck.

Shot of adrenaline, euphoria, it always got Jin by. Easy, and he loved it when things were simple and easy. Missions always did this to him, the victories blasted him high and the failures crashed him after. PTS: Post Traumatic Sex. Never failed. Never fixed, either, not really. Jin had turned his back on it once, on the missions and CARD and Kame and the whole mess. At the time it had been the best decision of his life.

Here he was again.

"Oh, fuck," Jin hissed through clenched teeth, on his back being spread wide open. He'd forgotten how much this could hurt. Spasms lodged in his throat to block the self-mocking laugh; something about it always hurt, the part where he felt stabbed in the filthier recess of his heart and bled clean (or close to it).

Kame gripped Jin's leg where it was bent over his shoulder, short nails making indents in the flesh-covered muscle of his thigh. Kame's typical razor focus was flooded with desire, the snap of his hips less checked, and that was the part that made Jin's toes curl in heady satisfaction. He slipped a hand towards the heavy, full weight of his cock smearing wetness on his stomach, only for Kame to growl and catch his wrist.

"No," Jin whined, making noises of protest in lieu of logical articulation expounding on why that was un-fucking-fair. Kame had been indulging him completely to this point.

His complaints changed quality when Kame folded him and pressed closer. Less no, more yes, finally reduced to gasps against Kame's mouth, whimpers and moans exchanged in melting kisses. Stretched aching to the limit, compressed tight enough to explode.

Maybe he'd been wrong. It wouldn't be the first time.

Jin swallowed the shape of his name where it poured from Kame's mouth, claimed it, and clung to Kame's shuddering, breaking frame above him. He held onto Kame's shoulder, the back of his neck, finding some way to hold together in the midst of it all.

Maybe he could still live like this.

♥ || ♠

Jin showered, even shaved, while Kame went out to buy food for dinner. He also dipped into Kame's wardrobe because living in the same clothes for three days straight was starting to feel grungy even for him. He already knew from previous experience that in these instances Kame was not averse to sharing. "Where is it, where is it..." He rifled through a drawer. "Aha, score!" Jin withdrew an unopened package of Calvin Kleins. Trust Kame to have brand new extras. Next he threw on a faded Yomiuri Giant's t-shirt, and then for a moment he considered declaring it Pantless Tuesday rather than try to squeeze into any of Kame's jeans, before triumphantly emerging with a pair of drawstring pants.

He snagged a sparkly purple hair-tie to hold his damp hair back without thinking to question its presence the same way he didn't question the bottles of nail polish. There had also been a bottle of hair dye in the bathroom, inky black matching the locks that had been mussed by Jin's hands barely an hour ago. Jin wondered what color Kame's hair had been before.

Idleness led to boredom which led to snooping. At first entertaining thoughts of coming across a hidden porn stash, Jin was instead unfazed to discover a Kimber Eclipse .45 ACP in the sock drawer and a Kobun knife in an accessory box. The katana under the bed, however, was a more of a surprise. 

When the door banged open upon Kame's return he was laden with bags of groceries after having evidently decided to go all out and stock up. 

"Welcome back," Jin called from where he sprawled on the bed reading Kame's One Piece manga.

There was half a pause. Then the bags rustled and Kame said, "I'm back. Come help me with these."

Putting away the groceries was a clumsy affair because of the small kitchen, and cooking almost disastrous due to the same. Jin ended up banishing himself to the couch, happy enough to let Kame do the work. "Lazy," Kame accused with no bite, indulging him again.

"It's been a really long time since anyone cooked for me," Jin said in his defense, sitting with his arms crossed over the back of the couch and chin resting on top. He watched Kame chop vegetables and add them into a frying pan.

"Your girlfriend didn't?"

Jin snorted. "Nothing edible. And there was that time she set her place on fire."

Kame glanced up from the eggs he cracked into a bowl. "Seriously?"

"Seriously." Jin grinned at the memory. At the time it hadn't been funny at all of course. Fortunately Rosa hadn't been hurt—hadn't even been home when it happened because she had stepped out to do something and left the gas stove on, but he'd heard about the damage fees. She'd moved in with him after that, and when she left she'd left for good. 

_"This isn't working,"_ she'd said, but failed to explain why in a way he understood. Something he'd done or hadn't done. Something about misaligned expectations. All he knew was that he disappointed her somehow, which wasn't even a habit anymore so much as an intrinsic character flaw. Jin was well-aware, and at this point he just accepted it.

"Hey," Jin began once they were seated in front of the TV again, chopsticks poised over a bowl of fried rice. The DVD menu for Moulin Rouge splashed across the screen, a movie selection that was gaudily over the top, spectacularly camp, and likely to reduce both of them to tragedy-stricken tears by the end. Plus, lots of scantily-clad cabaret girls.

"Hm?" Kame scrolled through the settings and hit play.

_Would you hate me if...?_

No, Jin wasn't ready to fuck all this up yet. He would later, inevitably, but not now. Not here. He started shoveling food into his mouth to decrease the chance of ruining everything. "This is good," he said in between bites, then added, "turn up the volume."

"We're really going to piss off my neighbors," Kame said, but complied so that by the time they'd finished off the Kirin both of them were dramatically singing along to the Elephant Love Medley.

♥ || ♠

Finding out CARD employed an in-house medical doctor (highly questionable though he may be) had been a surprise, but finding out they also employed an in-house psychologist didn't faze Jin at all. He even approved of this new addition—until Kame said Jin had an appointment with the guy.

"It's required at regular intervals or after every assignment."

"I'm not—but that was—"

Kame turned to him and the pity on his face gave Jin hope. "If you feel that strongly about it..."

"I DO."

"...then I can sit in with you. But you will have to speak for yourself."

What a patronizing asshole. "You are a patronizing asshole," Jin said in case Kame wasn't aware.

"Do you need me to hold your hand and walk you there?"

"NO. God, I'm an adult."

"It's good that you realize it."

Still, when Jin found himself standing alone in front of a door with a nameplate that read KOYAMA, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST, he seriously considered skipping out. No one would be the wiser. Okay, that was a lie, everyone would find out and then he'd have to deal with their bullshit and Kame might think—

"Let's get this over with," Jin said as soon as he opened the door. He came up short when he realized how tiny the room was, almost walking into the large armchair positioned at an angle to the desk behind which the psychologist sat. There was a bookcase packed with thick texts, a filing cabinet, and a potted plant in the corner. No windows of course. Everything, even the pot, was bolted to the floor.

"Akanishi-san?" Koyama greeted him with a smile that didn't really indicate he worked routinely with a bunch of criminal headcases. "You're early, but please have a seat and we can get started."

"Early again?" Jin checked his watch—oh, that's right, it was still set ahead. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. On one hand it was sort of nice to look respectable and timely, but he really wasn't a respectable and timely person. He supposed it wasn't hurting him, though. "So how does this work? I'm not so good at feely-sharey."

"There's no set schedule or anything. You can tell me anything—feelings, sure, how your assignment went, or what you had for breakfast this morning. Whatever you're comfortable with."

Jin fidgeted in the chair experimentally but there was no changing the fact that after yesterday he was pretty damn sore. "As far as comfort goes, I think you could use a footrest here."

"Not enough room, and it'd have to be connected to the chair or bolted down."

Jin eyed the firmly attached furniture. "Get a lot of violent visitors?"

"I used to have two plants."

"I see."

Koyama's chair seemed to be the only thing not stuck to the floor and he wheeled it backwards to open a drawer in his desk. "We don't have to talk if you don't want. I have some games as well..."

"Not cards," Jin groaned. "What is it with this place and cards? Strip poker's been ruined for me."

"Hmm. Chess?"

Jin crossed his arms. "Do I look like I play chess?"

"Then Go is probably out too, huh?"

"Give the man a prize."

"Candy Land?"

_Don't be retarded_ , Jin wanted to say. Instead what came out was, "I call the red guy."

♥ || ♠

Jin wasn't sure what prompted him to broach the subject, maybe he was only waiting for an opportunity, and he was currently way ahead in the game. His character had lucked out and taken the Rainbow Trail right away, now he was rounding the bend towards Lollipop Woods while Koyama wasn't even at the Gumdrop Mountains yet. "So," he said, moving his red character piece onto a green square. "I'm thinking maybe I'll be this fucked up forever."

Koyama drew a card and moved his blue guy to the yellow square, missing the Gumdrop Pass. "Any particular reason why?"

"Well, I like normal, you know." His next draw only got him one space ahead, onto red. "But normal doesn't seem to like me. I might as well... well."

"Planning to do anything about it?"

"Maybe. I don't know... damnit." He threw down the blue card and put his character on the dot, stuck for who knew how long. "Maybe I'm just not cut out for normal. Even my ex noticed." Rosa hadn't held anything against him, or so it seemed at the time. 

("Are you sure you don't want to go to the emergency room? You're bleeding, Christ." She pushed him into the bathroom and worked his shirt over his head, careful about brushing over the large, bloody abrasion all over his shoulder.

"Like I can afford that kind of bill—son of a bitch," Jin said, getting a look at the extreme road rash reflected in the mirror with a detached fascination. The cuts weren't deep and he didn't need stitches, but he was definitely missing layers of skin. He was still a little buzzed from the life-or-death edge of adrenaline and the pain wasn't registering as much as it would otherwise.

Rosa left and came back with a two-thirds-full bottle of vodka. "The mother could have paid for it. It's the least she could have done for saving her brat's life." She set a glass in front of him and poured him a shot. 

Jin downed it and that just added to the giddy, light-headed high. "Whatever..." Skidding and rolling on asphalt wasn't his idea of a fun time but it was better than being splattered by a car. He still hissed and swore when the alcohol was poured over the wound, every scrape on fire, carrying a burn through his system to pound loud and fast where his heartbeat felt like it emanated from the back of his throat rather than in his chest. He could almost taste the warm-blooded pulse of it.

Rosa refilled his glass before capping the bottle, now almost empty and she told him he owed her more Svedka. 

"Sure," Jin said, catching her wrist as she reached for the gauze and placing an intentioned, open-mouthed kiss to her palm. 

Her fingers curled around his chin, a thoughtful smile touching her lips as she said wickedly, "I know it's not the cheap alcohol doing this. Let me guess..." 

She never got to voice her theory and he never had to answer, pushing her against the sink and covering her lips with his own, her long nails raking through his hair. Rosa never minded when something—different—came up. She never questioned. She made it so easy. He could probably spend the rest of his life like this...)

"This is a stupid game," Jin announced when he drew for his third turn and still didn't come up with a blue card that would get him off the dotted square. He was going to be lost in Lollipop Woods forever and Koyama was catching up. "Is this all you do for these sessions, play board games? How does this help?"

"Generally, it's believed to open up conversation." Koyama drew a card and offered it to Jin. "You want this?"

Jin eyed the blue card and wondered if this was a test. "Are you going to tell on me if I cheat?"

"Patient confidentiality," Koyama promised with a solemn expression.

Jin crowed and finally drew for his turn, landing on a purple square. "I guess there are worse ways to spend an hour," he graciously conceded.

"Yes," Koyama said with a face that was all blank and unassuming neutrality. "This is pretty normal."

"Oh, hell, a pointed comment."

"Well, speaking as a professional—"

"I sure hope you're more certified than Tegoshi."

"I have a doctorate. Anyway, if I may be candid, every person in this organization is a bundle of twitchy neurosis in some shape or form. I was hired for a reason."

"Well... yeah." Jin leaned back, game forgotten. "So, what, I'm better off than most?"

"No more and no less, I'd say. Look, forget the normality thing. You're going to ask that for the rest of your life, and so is everyone else."

"Thanks, doc. So I belong here in this loony bin with all the other psychos." It wasn't exactly news to Jin.

"No, I didn't say that," Koyama said patiently. He opened a drawer in his desk and rummaged through it. "You're over-complicating things. Here." He slid something flat and round across the board.

It looked suspiciously like a girl's plastic compact case. Jin opened it and saw his own skeptical image mirrored inside the lid, the bottom only had an empty compartment for blush or eyeshadow or whatever. "Why do you even have this?"

"Self-reflection. Just focus on the guy you see in there for a while."

Jin wasn't a narcissist, his own face didn't appeal much to him. He closed the compact. "It's not like I have multiple personalities or anything. I just..."

"Might be having an identity crisis?" Koyama suggested.

Jin stared. He'd never thought about the issue in exact terms, and it sounded so pretentiously official and clinically detached that way. "So what am I supposed to do?"

"Look in the mirror. Think about what you want. Make some decisions."

That was when Jin decided Koyama's fancy degree didn't make him any less of a quack than Tegoshi. Worst shrink ever.

♥ || ♠

"What were you thinking? Crazy bitch!"

A pair of hands clamped over Raimu's ears, muffling the yelling going on over her head. She leaned back into the folds of a long skirt as the man in front advanced, and more words flew that she wasn't supposed to be hearing. A shadow fell across her face as a hand was raised, and she flinched, but there was no smack of flesh and no unsteady rocking of the foundation at her back. One of the woman's hands was gone from the side of her head.

Raimu clearly heard the man's pained little yelps, "ah-ah-ah!" before he stumbled back and cradled his wrist.

"You know better than to raise your hand against me," spoke the woman, more amused than offended. Her touch returned to smooth the neatly-plaited French braids dangling past Raimu's shoulders. "I only took her out for some fresh air. Who can stand this smell all the time?" 

Raimu hoped that didn't mean going back into the basement where it always reeked with the pungent smell of pickles, both the storage room for the Korean restaurant downstairs and the other room that the man and woman called the lab. The lab was set up like something out of a scary bedtime story, a long table piled with burners and noxious-smelling cooking pots, only there was no mad scientist lurking on the scene. Instead there were other boys and girls, older than her though not by much, measuring little piles of white powder and packaging them in plastic bags.

"Hell," the man spat—literally, a glob of spit landing on the floorboards, and that made Raimu's eyes go wide and scandalized when the bad words had hardly fazed her. "Tell me again where the payoff is? We didn't get the money, we're not putting her to work. Hey, we're not playing house here, get it?"

"You're right," the woman said in her smiling voice, still petting Raimu's hair in thoughtful strokes. "I'm about done playing."

♥ || ♠

"You took my Item Box!" Dry Bones was eating King Boo's dust in Bowser's Castle.

"I didn't see your name on it," Jin said, grinning with the tip of his tongue sticking out—at least until King Boo got fried by a fireball. "Aw, crap."

"Karma, bitch!" Koki cackled as his stupid skeleton drove by on a Quacker of all the ridiculous things.

King Boo touched down on the track again and Jin was ready for revenge when he got blasted away by a Bullet. "UNFAIR," he screeched at the screen.

"Nooo!" Koki desperately unleashed the item he just got, but all that did was loose a single, dinky banana behind his bike before he too was wiped out.

Birdo zoomed up from ninth place to third, accelerating off a ramp and doing a trick in mid-air. "Too easy," Taguchi said.

"Fuck Birdo." Jin scowled. "Am I right?"

"Right—HEY." Dry Bones got knocked into lava by King Boo in his Offroader.

Birdo made it to second and was closing in on Yoshi. "I'm coming for you, Kame-chan!"

Kame's brow was furrowed in concentration as Yoshi swerved to avoid lava geysers. He tapped a button to use his Mushroom, completing the second circuit and starting on the final lap.

Jin crashed into a wall because he was watching the wrong screen.

"Guys!" Nakamaru threw open the door of the suite. 

"YES," Koki triumphed as lightning flashed and everyone else shrunk to miniature.

"Guys—"

Birdo launched a Shell. Yoshi fired one in reverse to intercept it and kept his lead.

"HA." Jin's eyes lit up as he got a Star. He squeezed the button, intent on glory (or failing that, at least ruining someone else), when the TV went black and dead silence filled the room.

"Guys," Nakamaru said again, calmly putting the remote control down. "We've located Raimu-chan."

♥ || ♠

Jin checked how much time he had left and picked up speed as he ran down the corridor, cursing the layout of the compound. He was going to have to haul ass all the way to the garage after this, but with his luck he'd get lost and wind up stuck in a maze of doors and twisty hallways. His watch said he had a few minutes to spare even taking into account it was set ahead. The weird sense of his personal time being off set loose yet another butterfly into the swarm fluttering around in his stomach, and Jin determined to correct it. But later, when the minutes weren't ticking louder than usual.

He skidded to a halt in front of the double doors of the infirmary, sneaking a look through the window first before slipping inside. No sign of Tegoshi, maybe luck was with Jin after all. He hoped it lasted.

Only one of the beds was still occupied, the boy in it fast asleep. They'd found out with the help of the other children that he was Thai and his name was Kiet. He was around nine, making him the oldest of the bunch they rescued, and he knew some broken Japanese but as of yet hadn't been in any shape to converse. The bullet had gone through his upper right arm near the shoulder, enough to the side to avoid vital arteries and the scapula but fracturing the humerus bone. Healing would be slow, and a shoulder spica cast enveloped his whole arm and part of his torso, but he'd survive. 

Jin raised a hand to the solid lump of metal concealed inside the holster vest he wore, specially outfitted by Ueda. The Px4 Storm was fully loaded with a thirteen round magazine and he had extra ammo in the other pocket. He also had the Recon Tanto in its usual place. The whole gang was gearing up for this one; Ace, Red King, Queen, and Joker loaded for bear with Black King and Jack providing technical support.

He was a bit thrilled and bit sickened at the same time, and as Jin looked down at Kiet's thin, fragile frame he pressed his hand more firmly over the gun that was burning a hole through the leather. He blinked and pictured himself back in the warehouse three years ago, sighting down a barrel and squeezing off the one round needed to exchange someone's life, weighing what it was worth and passing judgment. Afterwards, weighing the regret.

Standing here now kept adding more to the pile. He wasn't sure to which side, but the one thing he knew was that either part of the scale tipping would break something in him, and it wouldn't heal the way bones did.

As he ghosted out of the infirmary another set of footsteps fell in just a little behind him, measured and unobtrusive from a respectful distance. The tightness in Jin's shoulders eased with recognition; they were less of a sound and more of a presence accompanying him through the passages.

He figured he was nearing the garage when the back of his neck prickled. Half-turning, Jin raised a hand to automatically catch the compact leather case that flew by his ear. The feel of it told him instantly what it was and he flicked open the snap-over flap to verify the standard lock pick set. Five picks, two tension tools. Stainless steel, quality manufacturer logo printed on the case. A dull, angry buzz made itself known in the back of Jin's mind, never entirely forgotten, merely ignored for a while.

"You know the plan, right?" Kame hooked his thumbs in his belt loops, glancing once into Jin's eyes before falling away.

"Obviously," Jin said with a bite that had been long in coming. "It's the only thing I'm good at and you wouldn't bother with useless baggage." This wasn't that small apartment space of neutral ground. Rules and consequences still applied. He shoved the case into the inside pocket of his vest with the extra magazine and quickened his pace down the hall. The set was a sight better than the makeshift crap he used last time, but still a far cry from his personalized tools. He wasn't about to thank Kame for his consideration. 

"Jin."

" _What?_ " He spun around.

Kame pointed down the left branch of the hall. "Garage is this way."

This place needed signs or something. Face burning, Jin shoved his hands into his pockets and made sure to crash his shoulder against Kame's when he passed. He half-expected retaliation, even if only in the form of a bitten-off sigh or click of tongue against teeth, but this time when Kame followed he was absolutely silent. Jin stared straight ahead hard enough for strain to build behind his eyes.

♥ || ♠

_"This is criminally unfair. I want barbeque!"_

_"They don't serve barbeque there."_

_"I still want some."_

Jin focused on shoveling more glass noodles in his mouth so he wouldn't rip the tiny earpiece out and crush it beneath his heel. If he'd known he was going to be subject to this kind of inane babble he'd have sooner shoved the device up Taguchi's nose than accept it. He didn't need anyone telling him what to do, anyway.

_"Is he still stuffing his face? Akanishi, get moving!"_

He propped his elbow up on the table and put his chin in his hand, hissing into the microphone in his pinky ring, "Shut up. Just shut the fuck up." He straightened and sat back when the waitress came by to refill his glass of water. Toyed with the idea of ordering another dish else out of spite.

_"Akanishi, go."_

Yeah, yeah. Jin pushed his chair back—not because Kame told him to, but because Raimu was waiting. He caught the waitress watching him as he got up, hopefully just making sure he wasn't going to skip out on the check and not, say, planning to have him knocked out, dumped in a bag, and tossed into the bay. He never knew with this kind of assignment.

"Toilet," he said to her, though so far no one working in the restaurant had spoken a word of Japanese. The menu was in both hangul and katakana, so whatever. He made his way to the back, passing the kitchen and having to flatten against the wall to avoid wearing a dish of kimchi. The server snapped at him in Korean but otherwise continued bustling on his way. "Friendly people here," Jin muttered, and once the coast was clear he disappeared through a door that was marked in a way that surpassed language barriers: Employees Only.

He surmised that unless someone was sitting quiet in the dark there was no one else around. Jin flipped a switch and a couple of interspersed naked bulbs lit the way down a wooden staircase. The space at the bottom was small, mostly crowded with shelves full of crates and boxes.

_"Anything?"_ This time Kame's voice was licked by static. Interference from being underground, maybe.

"Let me check the cold storage." A hard yank was required to pull open the heavy door and cool air wafted out as Jin stuck his head through the plastic strip curtain. His nose was immediately assaulted by the reek of fermented vegetables. Lifetime supply of kimchi, check. He took one of the plastic containers and wedged it in the doorway to keep it from locking shut as he explored further. The problems you could avoid, you did.

Individual freezers were packed with raw meat and seafood. Nothing suspicious or horrific like body parts mixed in, and the restaurant seemed like it would pass a sanitation inspection which was more than he could say about other places he'd explored. All looked normal and unassuming until the fourth freezer down which was empty, its insides smooth rather than ice-encrusted. Even the shelves had been taken out. 

That was something he might be able to work with, and Jin was a born snooper. He stepped back to examine the boxy outside. All the units were large, but they were also on wheels. Taking hold of the empty one he found it easy to pull away from the wall. There wasn't enough room for him to back it out all the way, he had to switch to the side to drag it completely free and then push it in front of another freezer, but the effort paid off. In the new block of space there was another door, and the dust on the ground in front of it was disturbed in the shape of footprints.

A shiver that had nothing to do with temperature tingled across his nerves. Jin's new tools made quick work of the lock. "Got something," he said into the microphone as the door eased open. A narrow staircase was faintly illuminated by a line of light arrowing down the passage. 

_"Wait a moment. Don't. You. Move."_

"Hell, no, I'm moving."

_"Jin—"_

Jin pried the earpiece loose, and with epic restraint he held back from smashing it for his own satisfaction. It went into his pocket instead. The Court should know better anyway—when the King of Hearts took point nothing ever went as planned and the associated name of Suicide King was both earned and deserved.

These stairs were more modern than the rickety steps connecting above and went down much deeper. Jin made the descent carefully and quietly, leaving behind the soft, constant hum of refrigeration. When he reached the bottom he might have been three levels belowground, and Jin muffled a groan when he saw the length of a corridor branching off into several more. Just like CARD headquarters, but even more claustrophobic, darker, and altogether unpleasant.

There was one bright side, and that was the glow of light that snaked along the ceiling. It wasn't part of the architecture—actually it looked like a decorative fluorescent rope light, or rather dozens of them trailing after one another. They lit a path through the maze that Jin dutifully followed, coming to a panel of wall with a wheel in the center. An oversized deadbolt mechanism, all he had to do was turn the wheel to unlock it. He pushed the door open a crack, then withdrew his gun but didn't switch the safety off. Not yet.

Silence and stillness had never come easily to Jin, they were qualities born only of necessity in certain situations. Patience fell into the same category. The loudest sound down here was his heart pounding, an anxious and almost lunatic insistence of _GO, GO, GO, GO_ , and he couldn't tell if it meant charging in or fleeing back. He was balanced on a razor's edge, and somewhere some part of him liked every insanity-spiked second where nothing else mattered.

Except one thing did matter, and Jin clung onto it the way he should have clung to Raimu that day in Disneyland. He was so paranoid, yet not paranoid enough. Three years running and avoiding the exact sort of mess he was in now with blood on his hands and what-if's buzzing in his head. He couldn't save everyone. He knew that. There was nothing anyone could do about the way the cards fell. But if he was going to admit to his addictions, and he knew he had a few, all he could do was keep playing until he won, hoping that when it happened he'd stop before he had nothing else to lose.

The safety made an audible click as it was switched off. Jin swung the door the rest of the way open.

The room was huge and dark like the rest of the place, but for two overhanging lamps strung above a table piled with all the paraphernalia of a clandestine lab. The stringent scent in the air this time wasn't kimchi, but judging by the still-prevalent odor of pickles... acetic anhydride, a key chemical in heroin synthesis.

Jin stepped inside, scanning what lay beyond the bright pools of light. The room had the appearance of a warehouse, shelves piled with boxes, and that was when he clued in to what this place was. One of the underground shelters supposedly maintained by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, stocked with emergency supplies—although Jin was willing to bet there was more than blankets and candles stored here. Bricks of morphine smuggled from overseas, innocuous boxes of sodium carbonate, tablets of activated charcoal for purification.

There only thing moving in the shadows was Jin himself as he drew nearer to the table. The burners were off, enamel cooking pots empty but coated in residue, cool to the touch and dry.

The implication set off bursts of firework despair. _Damnit, no!_ Forgetting stealth, Jin paced through the rest of the warehouse, hauling open more panel doors and using the display light of his phone to navigate dark hallways. There was a room filled with piles of blankets, rank with the odor of packed bodies but lacking physical sources. He found another staircase and heard the rumble of a train nearby, but didn't bother following it up to the station.

"Fuck me, they're gone," he said into the microphone, belatedly remembering to retrieve the earpiece from his pocket. "What?" He could barely make out what Kame was saying through the crackle and cuts of the transmission.

_"—upstairs..."_

♥ || ♠

The compact room above the restaurant still held the aroma of Korean cuisine, as well as cheap perfume. Sparsely-furnished but wholly feminine, there was a makeup mirror on the table along with a hairbrush that retained several strands of dark, fine hair in the bristles. Koki dropped it in a plastic bag for forensics to test, commenting, "From the looks of things everyone pulled out fast. This is messy. Bet we'll find the drugs still downstairs, too."

Kame pulled a shoebox from the closet, empty save for the tissue paper. "Children's size 12," he read from the label. "Nothing else in here." The laundry rack was also bare.

Jin straddled a chair with his arms resting on the back, facing the corner where the futon was neatly folded. On top of it was a large plush doll. Daisy Duck sat propped up against the wall, her big felt eyes oblivious to Jin's efforts to burn a hole into her head with his stare.

He'd already told the guys about the woman called Mizuki, about his first encounter with Kiet and how everything started. He'd described her as best as he could remember, but it wasn't much. Attractive but not stunning, older than she had claimed to be but she could have lied, and who knew how different she might appear wearing more makeup and entirely different clothes.

_Mizuki, Mizuki, Mizuki._ He bounced the name around in his mind but no matter how he thought about it, there was nothing else he could come up with regarding the woman. Nothing especially odd about her manner or appearance at the time. Just a normal stranger. Maybe Kiet would be able to tell them something new about that day.

"Should we take this, too?" Koki plucked up the doll by the bow and gave it a jaunty shake.

Jin's gaze dropped to the vacant spot on top of the futon and felt his mouth go dry at what he saw.

He dove for the card, knocking the chair over in the process and shoving Koki out of the way.

"Hey, what—"

Kame's card. And if the King of Hearts was also the Suicide King, then the Ace of Spades was the Death Card. Jin brandished the symbol for all to see. "Paranoid, am I? What's this supposed to mean?"

"Bag it," Kame said offhandedly, dropping his gaze. "We'll run it for prints at the lab like the others."

"And probably come up with nothing like the others." Koki made a grab for the card but Jin snatched his hand away.

He twisted and tore through the thin cardboard, into halves and then quarters and crumpling them tightly in a fist, willing in vain for them to disappear along with the panicked fury eating away at his restraint. Kame studiously ignored his theatrics while Koki looked back and forth between the two of them. The nonchalance was too much and Jin felt something in him snap.

He marched forward and invaded Kame's space, knowing by the way Kame went even more rigid that this wouldn't be ignored. Not this time. "What aren't you telling me?"

"A lot of things." Kame's tone was calm and even. "You're not a permanent member of this team. You don't need to know."

"Stop it. Just—stop. Quit saying that shit, it's not the point." A new vein of anger opened up and joined the other one, outrage overpowering the icy fear.

"Let it go, Jin. You know you should."

Jin laughed aloud at that, and kept laughing at the guarded expression drawing shut over Kame's face. Of course he knew. He'd only been thinking about it constantly for the past several years, arguing for and against from every possible angle with a diligence that no one would have given him credit for. It was just that, no matter what conclusion he came up with, in the end he only did whatever he felt he needed to do at the given time. Quitting the game. Re-entering. Upping the ante. The truth was that "should" had very little to do with the reality.

_"I'm thinking maybe I'll be this fucked up forever."_

At the very least he could come to terms with it.

"Jesus," Koki was muttering. He picked up the pieces of the card and zipped them into another plastic bag. "We should get out of here."

"Jin, get it together." Kame's professionalism was wearing thin, showing in the tightness around his mouth as he took his own advice and clutched at his seams. The sight of Kame trying so hard made Jin throw up his hands.

"Hey, I think I told you this before, but fuck you and the horse you rode in on." Jin twisted the ring off his pinky and tossed it aside, letting it bounce and roll across the floor. Next was the earpiece, and this time he indulged himself in crushing it beneath his heel. It was probably an expensive bit of equipment too. But what was CARD going to do, sue him? Fuck them, too.

"Jin," Kame warned, but all that did was make Jin step out of swinging range.

"No, you know what? You can shut up and leave me alone. Stop making my decisions for me." Jin turned, catching sight of his face as he passed the mirror, reminding him of Koyama's dubious counsel. Well, here he was, putting himself first. "The only person who can decide what's best for me is me. Not Kamenashi, not the Ace, not CARD. Me." He yanked the door open and was primed to slam it as he walked out when Kame spoke up.

"The blood was yours. On your card."

Jin paused, absorbing the information. His system was already on overdrive and he barely registered the shock. He waited for questioning, calmly sorted through his prepared I-don't-know's, but the inquisition never came. "That's it, no third degree?"

"Be careful," was all Kame said after a heartbeat, letting him go. Inexplicably, that only made Jin angrier.


	5. Chapter 5

Jin was in Shinjuku when the Kinokuniya store front caught his eye. He crossed over to it and headed inside, passing over the shelves of manga and magazines to areas where he rarely ventured. Browsing through titles, he skimmed the pages of anything containing the keyword, "identity." The first few books he shelved again immediately, not interested in the postwar national identity crisis of Japan. The only crisis he cared about was his own.

He thought he lucked out with an English text by guy named Erik Erikson. Jin's English was pretty good after living in the U.S. for a while, and he managed to get through two pages of the preface before skipping that part entirely, and then grew increasingly frustrated with the rest of the book. Who and what was it talking about? Psychosocial moratorium? And something about Freud, wasn't he the guy all about sex? And then there was the arbitrary German vocabulary.

No wonder therapy was bullshit if this was what it was based on. Jin shoved the book back on the shelf with the rest of its ostentatious brethren, and wandered back out onto the street.

Identity crisis. Geez. Kame should be the one with the identity crisis, seeing how many different people he'd been all his life, sometimes a stranger even to Jin. And sometimes Jin thought it'd be easier that way. As for his own self... 

Starting from the beginning, he'd been a scrawny brat swiping snacks from the small shop on the outskirts of Tokyo where he lived with his mom and brother, then soon became the petty thief picking a salary man's pockets during the evening rush at the train station. A punk kid considered a lost cause by his teachers, a poor role model for Reio, and a burden on his mom. He'd been aware of it, had considered leaving, and on occasion had threatened to do just that only for his mom to hold onto him tight, too proud to beg and too loving to let him go.

Jin paused in front of an arcade, taking in the flashing lights and noises crashing around inside. School must have just let out because the place was beginning to draw in a trickle of kids in uniforms. He'd proven his teachers right at least, dropping out of high school after the funeral that had orphaned him and his brother. Worked for a while, got into several screaming fights with Reio about him staying in school, and wasn't as good as his mom when it came to holding on to people. Luckily or unluckily, the two brothers had no one else and were stuck together anyway.

As Jin left the arcade behind a new scene unfolded in yellow and black construction tape. A section of the road was blocked off and clouds of dust billowed up from the rapid fire of a jackhammer biting into pavement. Honest work: Jin had turned out to be pretty shit at it. Thievery, now, that was something he could do. Had always done, it seemed like, and went on doing until he was getting away with grand theft in diamonds and the only thing that had kept the cops from busting down his door was CARD getting there first.

After clearing up a misunderstanding about what kind of "services" he was being solicited for, Jin joined up without even listening to the rest of the recruitment speech. If there'd been fine print he wouldn't have read it. All he saw was what seemed at the time to be a dream within reach; getting to do what he did best and avoiding the problems that came with it. CARD found out they had relatives in Italy and were able to send Reio there. Jin could have simply gone with him, but at that point he'd already put himself on one side of a line and his little brother on the other. They still kept in contact through irregular emails.

Jin patted his pockets; gun, lock picks, knife, phone, some cash and loose change, cheap lighter—but he was out of smokes. It didn't take long to come across a vending machine, though. He dug out some coins to buy a pack of Marlboro Lights, coming up with ¥320 and that damnable white chip again. The pad of his thumb rubbed and caught against the plastic ridges of its surface.

CARD had given him a new name but not really a new identity. When the King of Hearts had been uncovering evidence of counterfeit production in a top business exec's home he was still breaking and entering and getting his dirty hands where they didn't belong, and loving every thrilling second. Every sneaky success. For the greater good, of course.

And when the Suicide King had gone off fucking everything up in every which way, well, he'd still had his uses. Still in the game, raising the stakes. Then he'd been putting a 9mm bullet into the head of someone he knew, for the good of the organization, for his own good, for _someone's_ good, and CARD's first and foremost rule leaked out all over the warehouse floor in bright red and wet gray matter.

It still had taken several hours, a lot of hard drinking, and mind-blowingly intense PTS for the self-realization and proper horror to register. Once it finally had he was basically the most useless he'd ever been throughout his entire, undistinguished, wretched life. The fact was reinforced when Jin said he was leaving and nobody had stopped him.

A spring breeze whisked away the lungful of smoke Jin expelled, cigarette tucked between his lips where he stood on an overpass. Traffic moved sluggishly underneath, taxis and trucks bumper to bumper. Comparatively, a lone plane jetted overhead against a backdrop of clear blue sky, destination unknown.

LA had been his fresh start. And honest start, even. Well, mostly—he wasn't sure how he became the go-to person whenever a friend lost their keys, and so what if a few of his acquaintances hailed from the ghetto, Jin still kept his hands out of strangers' pockets and stores' display cases. He didn't think composing songs and singing occasionally in the neighborhood coffeehouse made him any more of a useful person, but it didn't make him less of one either. Average and normal wasn't what most people typically aimed for, but dreams were relative. 

Rosa had been part of his dream for a while. Maybe even a large part until she exited stage left, and the show couldn't go on without its star. Without something to revolve around, without gravity to keep him in orbit, Jin drifted towards whatever would pull him in.

He supposed that meant he was slowly being sucked back into CARD's black hole and this time he might resign himself being crushed there. It wasn't the bravest of choices, but he was hardly the bravest of men.

"You look like you're down on your luck." 

Jin laughed a little, curls of smoke framing his face. Ash crumbled off the tip of his cigarette and was lost to the crush of traffic below. "Yeah. Yeah, I am." 

Coming to stand nearby was familiar face—or not so much the face, but the wrinkled suit Jin definitely remembered. "Sorry to hear it. Guess this didn't help you much." A white chip appeared between his fingers, identical to the one he'd given Jin before. With a flick it went sailing over the rail.

Jin's eyes followed it as it bounced off the hood of a cab and disappeared under rolling tires. That was all the motivation he needed to reach for the chip still in his pocket and fling it into the distance, like throwing money into a fountain. Make a wish.

"Want to know a secret?" He didn't even wait for Jin's response before saying, "I know something that can turn your luck around."

"I seriously doubt that."

"Here."

Jin spared the guy a dubious glance, ready to turn down the hostess card or sketchy flyer, but the object resting in the open hand was neither. Nonplussed, Jin picked up the cell phone. It didn't look like a new model so he supposed the guy wasn't trying to make a sale. There was already a number entered on the display.

He gave a mental shrug—why the hell not?—and pressed the call button. One ring, two, three...

Click.

At first he only heard the distorted sound of a voice speaking from far away. It got close enough near the end to him to catch, "—say hello."

Female, he identified. Maybe it was just some hostess or soapland girl after all.

"Hello?"

Jin stopped breathing. His heart suddenly lodged somewhere up in his throat and he willed it to stop too so he could hear past the noise and confirm he wasn't imagining things.

"...Hello?" Raimu asked tentatively over the line again.

♥ || ♠

Kame's phone rang and rang, noisily filling the space of his private room on the compound. Kame grabbed the device from his desk and stared wearily at the name on the display. For a second his finger had hovered over the keypad, a button away from turning his phone off completely and then nothing short of the Dealer himself armed with access codes could have bothered him. He'd barricaded himself in here enough times as a kid, only it had never been the head of the organization that made him open up. Jin was their breaking and entering specialist in more than one sense. If pounding incessantly on the door didn't work he'd resort to all sorts of outrageous threats. From anyone else Kame wouldn't have given them a second thought, but invariably, he always fell helpless to the nagging possibility of, _It's Jin, he might actually do it._

But Jin wasn't going to come knocking anytime soon anymore. He had his pride, though it apparently wasn't enough to get him out of here for good. It was only enough—and Kame's own stubbornness was enough—to mire them both in this mess of their own making. Kame curled on his side, reminded himself he wasn't an immature brat anymore, and put the phone to his ear.

"Hello?" he managed to answer right before the call went to voicemail.

"Is this a bad time?" Nakamaru asked nervously. Maybe it was Kame's tone, or the length of time it had taken for him to pick up, or the fact that Nakamaru had overheard the entire exchange with Jin an hour ago.

Kame snorted into the receiver. "If you're waiting for a good time that might be a while. What is it?"

"Well... I found something on Akanishi."

There was no one around to see Kame curl in on himself further, stomach knotting up as he said, "I thought you dropped that investigation."

"I did. Didn't find anything that time. I guess it would be better to say something came up in connection to him. After talking with Kiet-kun I dug up as much as I could on the people he described. One's minor, an informant who frequents the gambling hall, he couldn't possibly know enough to be our inside leak. But the other's a woman you might have heard of, and the lab confirmed..."

Kame listened and felt all the knots inside him loosen to clear a path for his heart to fall. He slowly sat up. "Have you reported this to anyone else?"

"No," Nakamaru said. Then he amended apologetically, "Not yet."

Kame may demand difficult things, but he didn't ask for the impossible. "Okay."

"How long?"

He hesitated before answering. It wasn't his call to make. "We'll play it by ear."

Nakamaru's assent was surprised, but he didn't question. He must have had more faith in Kame than Kame did himself, but in the end that was all someone really needed. 

It had been a long time since Kame had retreated into this room for the purpose to avoid others. He wasn't sure when exactly the reason changed, became a different kind of habit, but even now he could admit that despite everything, he was waiting for that familiar, insistent knock that was impossible to ignore or refuse. 

If Jin could admit to being an adult now, so could he. Kame rolled up into a sitting position, feet smacking against the floor. He scrolled through the contacts on his phone. Selected the number he needed. 

"Iriguchi, deguchi, Taguchi desu!"

"You're in the comm room?"

"I am. Need to be hooked up?"

"Assemble the Court, ASAP."

"Including...?"

"Just the basics."

"Gotcha." 

Kame was already up and out the door, heading towards the Suite. No further prompting was needed. He'd been a coward, and living with piles of regrets wasn't actually living at all, it was surviving on scraps. Wretchedness was only making him more wretched. Enough. There was nothing Kame could do for anyone like this. He figured it was high time he went knocking on Jin's door instead, hoping to find it still open.

♥ || ♠

"You first," Jin ordered softly, the tip of the Beretta nudging against Suit's spine. They'd emerged from the man's Prius in front of an achingly picture perfect suburb house in Katsushika. The steps leading up to the door were lined with blooming flowerpots, freshly watered.

"For crying out loud, just don't disturb the neighbors! This is a nice area." Suit fidgeted under gunpoint but he didn't act truly afraid. Either he didn't think Jin could possibly pull the trigger in broad daylight, or he had balls of steel under the poorly-fitted pinstripes. 

He didn't withdraw a key at the door, pushing the button for the bell instead. Jin heard it chime within, and the approach of footsteps. Suit made for a human shield in front of him. The deadbolt lock turned with a click and the door swung cheerily open. Both men adjusted their gazes down a few feet to where Raimu hung off the doorknob.

Jin shoved the man out of the way and dropped to his knees as Raimu threw herself forward, her negligible weight colliding into him. He rocked back anyway, more because he could barely hold himself up, and all but crushed her to him, her small arms around his neck squeezing back. She smelled clean and faintly floral, wearing a daffodil-print sundress and matching clips in her hair that was brushed to a shine. There was a stickiness to her fingers and a dab of chocolate on her cheek that Jin wiped off with his thumb, then continued to stroke her soft skin in amazement.

"Hey," he said, swallowing the lump in his throat. "Hey. How have you been, kiddo?"

Raimu mirrored his gesture and patted the side of his face. "Okay, I guess," she said. "Is it time to go home now?"

"Come inside for a bit," said a new figure that stepped around the scowling man in the suit. Fear crashed down on Jin and he held Raimu tight as if he could pull her out of the dream with him, because it was Rosa who emerged, smiling in her thoughtful, sly way, and wiping her hands on an apron. "Have some cookies first."

♥ || ♠

The soft, gooey chocolate chip cookie melted in Jin's mouth and settled rich on his taste buds. In his lap Raimu licked her fingers clean, legs kicking and absently knocking against his shin in little thumps of dull pain that seemed determined to prove his dream theory wrong. But he was sitting on a comfortable sofa in a sunlit living room with Raimu in his arms and his ex-girlfriend pouring a cup of coffee for him. The domesticity was unreal.

"Here," she said, placing the cup on a coaster. There were _coasters._ And decorative throw pillows. And tasteful curtains. 

Honestly, Jin was a little creeped out. "Where did you learn how to bake?" he demanded, perhaps rudely, but Rosa had never been the coffee-serving, cookie-baking type. She'd been the type that danced by herself in clubs, got high and painted her walls with murals of places no one had ever been, and she always took her coffee with a shot of Baileys. Jin had seen her pour her own cup and when he tasted his (made just the way he liked) there was none of that Irish Cream kick.

At least Rosa's smile was the same, an inviting curve that promised to share secrets and keep others. "Self-taught. Willpower goes a long way. You should try my cooking next."

Jin couldn't handle this anymore. "What the fff—" He covered Raimu's ears and hissed sotto voce, "What the hell? Why are you here? And what's with him?" He jerked his head at Suit, who was skulking in the kitchen and shooting poisonous looks at them every so often. It was all just bizarre.

"Business before pleasure, Jin? You?"

"Rosa," Jin snapped, his business mode having already been stretched over a period of days. "Are you _baked?_ What's going on?"

Her patiently reproachful look was unsettlingly familiar. He'd never noticed before. "I'm perfectly clean, Jin. I thought it was only fair." She looked around the house, lips pursed in thought. "What do you think? You were never that specific when you talked about it but I figured this was standard family living."

" _What?_ "

"We can always change things, even move. I'm still partial to the States myself."

Jin stared, and wished for incomprehension to strike him dumb because the understanding that was starting to form was too horrible. "This—did you—but you were the one who left!"

"I regretted it." She didn't put on a sad face, trying to prove her feelings with a show of tears like some girls might have. Instead she contemplated and sounded out the facts. "I was too unyielding. I didn't want normal, and you never tried to make me normal so I thought it was fine for a while. I thought you'd come around, but you never did. Not until I left, apparently, but I'd started changing my mind before that."

Jin was suddenly filled with apology towards Kame. He'd thought Kame was a stranger sometimes, but that didn't compare to who he was sitting across from now. Didn't even come close. "Who are you?"

That question took her aback. "Jin, I'm willing to compromise here. What you want and what you need, I can give you both."

"I don't think so," he said, sugar and caffeine turning into nauseating bile in his gut. "No. You can't. I can't."

Irritation creased her forehead. "You're still—"

"Ah, hell, it's not going to work." Suit came forward, brushing cookie crumbs from his hands onto the spotless white carpet. "Look, if you insist on playing house can you give me Liu's number first? We lost _all_ the goods to this charade and I don't fancy explaining to Tanuma why we don't even have the natural."

Rosa glared at the interruption. "Fine."

Jin saw her turn the slightest bit to where he'd (foolishly) left his gun lying on the table, and instinctual certainty kicked him in the ribs. "MOVE!" he screamed, pulling Raimu's face towards his chest, but the hammering of his heart wasn't loud enough to cover the burst of gunfire exploding from the Beretta.

Suit didn't have a chance. One .40 S &W bullet was all it took, point-blank, right between the eyes. The man dropped to the floor and red speckled the carpet with a spreading stain from around his head.

Gun smoke burned Jin's nostrils and Raimu began to cry.

"I did tell him I was done playing." Rosa turned back to Jin, hardly sparing a glance for the body once it had fallen. "Don't look at me like that. You put plenty of lead in Ichimonji the other day. Come to think of it, I know you're still armed, let's have it all out while we're being honest here."

Jin reached around Raimu, refusing to dislodge her where she clung to him, and removed the Recon Tanto from his waist to set it on the coffee table. "That's all," he said gruffly. 

"Your lock picks?"

"What about them?"

She laughed at that. "Oh, all right. It's not like I'm going to lock you up anyway."

"Really considerate of you. Really." Jin rocked the little girl in his lap and stroked her hair. She was beginning to calm down, cries subsiding into little hiccups and leaving a mess of tears and snot on his shoulder. Rosa offered him a box of tissues and he only hesitated a moment before accepting it.

"Believe it or not, Jin, I'm not forcing you into anything. I know you hate that."

Jin made a disparaging noise as he wiped gently at Raimu's face, then scrubbed his vest as an afterthought. "Don't lie, I've been following your pace from the start." The proof was on his wrist.

Rosa set the gun down in the center of the table and leaned back comfortably. "You made your own choices. You could have stayed out of it, let the police handle things."

"Like a coward?"

"Like a normal person."

That word again, bam, one more nail in the coffin. "What's normal anyway?" Jin muttered after struggling to find something to say. He looked around the house. It wasn't a mansion, nor especially luxuriant by Western standards, but in Tokyo it was damn nice. A thing of dreams, impossible and out of or each, but that never stopped anybody. He tried for sarcastic but all he came up with was wistful: "This?"

When Rosa softened she could be like a little girl herself. She'd had dreams too back then, wilder than his, always shared with a laugh. "If you want. A home, a ring on your finger, a kid... It's nicer than I thought it would be. I could live like this with you."

Jin's gaze slid towards the body of the man, her business partner of some sort, that she'd so casually shot. He made sure Raimu was facing away from it. No matter how he wished otherwise his tough outer shell was a joke; he was all soft underbelly in this moment. "And that?"

"The meeting with Tanuma is at three o'clock tomorrow. He's with the Hikura family. He has the children from the lab, but I have the contacts for the opium."

_Who are you?_ he wanted to ask again. He was just enough of a coward to not look too hard at her, lest he find the answer. "There's no way I'm—"

"I didn't say you were." Rosa crossed her legs, her smile conspiring. "I'll help you take him down and save everyone."

"...What?" Jin held onto Raimu like she was his lifeline, the last thing he was certain of anymore. "So you're not—who are you working for?"

"Oh, Jin," Rosa sighed, shoulders slumping while she shook her head ruefully. She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. "You must have realized by now. I'm no one's trained hunting dog, and neither are you."

"So you're just a criminal."

"And you?"

He lived with CARD's number one rule around his neck, a collar that chafed and would probably hang him eventually. Someone like Rosa had no such restraints, a true predator in the wild. Primordial. She'd found him and sunk her teeth in the collar and could easily pull it over his head, free him of the doubts that in a way kept him grounded, even if the place he was grounded was hell on earth. The thought of having nothing to suffer from and depend on made him sick with want and dread. 

"Let me—let me think about it."

♥ || ♠

Kame knew at the very least he had to inform the rest of the Court. Just so they wouldn't be surprised. Just in case they needed to be convinced, although he probably wasn't the best person to argue the case. And the others weren't as tractable as Nakamaru, who'd only known Jin for a few days.

When they were all gathered in the Black Suite he told them the news.

"No shit?" Koki kicked his feet up on the table and leaned back in his chair. "He sure knows how to pick 'em."

Rosa Kato, twenty-eight, born in Italy but raised in Japan until she was fourteen when she went missing after killing her Math teacher. The brutality of the murder suggested a vengeful motive, and accounts from other students indicated that Rosa had likely been victim to sexual harassment or worse at the teacher's hands. There was no substantial information on her for the next few years, mostly speculation about drug abuse and prostitution, until she killed again. The second murder was more coldly premeditated, as were the others that followed, and the ease with which she avoided law enforcement grew. It had been her hair they'd identified on the brush.

"I've heard of her," Ueda offered, skimming the files Nakamaru printed out. "Subterfuge is a necessary skill for an assassin but she's said to be exceptionally good at it."

"I still should have noticed sooner." Nakamaru held his head in his hands. "She's been quiet for so long, no red flags came up when I investigated under her pseudonym. I should've dug deeper into the people around Akanishi, but they all seemed relatively harmless, not too clean but not too dangerous."

"So what are our orders?" Taguchi asked. There was a recent addition to the graffiti on his cast; a doodle of a face with features that were eclipsed by an enormous nose and an arrow pointing that read, "Nakamura."

Kame dragged his gaze away from Jin's recognizable handwriting to look each one of the Court members in the eye. He took in a deep breath. "As of now? Sit back and wait."

Koki's feet thumped when they hit the floor. "You haven't officially reported this, have you?" He was grinning, though.

Some of the tightness in Kame's chest loosened. "Well, that's..."

"I don't think Akanishi is a traitor either," Taguchi put out there with a blunt sense of timing. He smiled his invincible smile.

Koki barked a laugh, agreeing, "He's not calculating enough for that kind of deception. Looks kind of bad from the outside, though."

"They were dating for a while," Nakamaru added with caution. "He could have let something slip accidentally, though I can't imagine it would be anything major."

"And as far as I know he doesn't talk in his sleep...?" Koki waggled his eyebrows meaningfully at Kame, who was hard-pressed not to smirk.

"Let's not go there," Ueda said dryly.

Kame's smirk turned into a full-fledged grin before it dampened somewhat remorsefully. He'd worried over nothing and seriously underestimated his team. "Thanks."

"For what?" Ueda interjected before the conversation veered into awkward, sentimental places. "Not caring about your bedroom life? Don't mention it."

"Man," Koki said, crossing his arms behind his head. "This is the third time we've gone against regulations for that guy. We're all going to be branded traitors at this rate." Yet he didn't sound too upset by the idea.

"Third time's the charm?" Taguchi suggested.

"Yeah, so in other words we're screwed."

"Don't lie," Kame admonished lightly. "If we stopped making the higher ups nervous they'd think we weren't doing our jobs."

They all shared a laugh, and it went without saying what their respective jobs would be for time being. Investigating from all fronts, doing some preliminary damage control, keeping an eye out for key developments. If Jin was still part of the team the way they thought of him as, he'd know what his job was too.

♥ || ♠

"Are you sure you want to go through with this?" Rosa licked the last traces of strawberry ice cream from her plastic spoon and threw the empty cup away as they passed a trash can. She wore a wide-brimmed white hat with a fluttery spring camisole and pastel skirt, drawing admiring gazes as they made their way through the park.

"She's not mine and her parents are worried," Jin said, tapping out a brief, no frills message on his phone in one hand and linking fingers with Raimu with the other. She was wearing a cherry-patterned dress today and there were still pale pink petals caught in her black hair. "How's this?" He tilted the screen for Rosa to see.

> _shinjuku-gyoen, sendagaya gate. tell pi sry it took this long."_

"Fine." She sighed a little, and brushed the petals from Raimu's hair with an affectionate hand. "I'm going to miss her though."

Jin scrolled through his contacts. He never had gotten around to asking for Kame's new number, but he'd gotten Nakamaru's. Better to let the Court handle it than mail Yamapi directly. "You took good care of her. Thanks." He sent the message and then turned off his phone.

Rosa took his hand once it was free. "Of course. I knew she was important to you, and you've always been fond of children."

Jin's hand tightened around hers enough to hurt, but she didn't complain. "And you say this isn't blackmail."

"You wish it was. That would make it easier for you, wouldn't it? But I'm only offering: with my help you can go right for the throat of the whole operation. Tanuma is only the start. I notice you haven't asked me why I don't go to CARD."

Because that would be like bringing a tiger out of the wild and into the home. Even housecats weren't fully domesticated. "I'd like to know how you know about that."

Rosa smiled and leaned her head on his shoulder. She also had stray cherry blossom petals in her hair. "Maybe I'll tell you later."

They reached Sendagaya Gate and Jin knew it wouldn't be long before the Court arrived. He still took the time to gather Raimu up in a hug and hold her for a while. "Be a good girl and wait here, okay? Don't talk to any strangers—unless it's a guy with a huge nose. Call him Nakamura. Or a guy named Kamenashi—"

"I know Kazu-nii."

Of course. Something warmed in Jin's chest. "Then I guess I don't have anything to worry about." He kissed the top of her head. "Tell your dad not to think too badly of me."

Raimu held fast to Jin's sleeve, eyes filling with tears. She was too young; all she knew was that she was being left alone.

Rosa intercepted with a tissue from her purse, dabbing at the corners of Raimu's eyes. "Don't cry, sweetie. If you wait for just a little bit you'll see your mom and dad. Here." Taking Jin's wrist, she deftly removed his watch and slipped it into the front pocket of Raimu's dress. "Hold onto this and you'll definitely be found."

Jin narrowed his eyes but Rosa only smiled back at him. So she'd found the GPS embedded in his watch when she'd tampered with it, and who knew how long ago that had been. He could have removed the tracking device anytime after leaving CARD, but had never gotten around to severing that last link, meant to allow the Court to find him in an emergency. It was useless from his end, though. For all Jin knew it didn't even work anymore, being over three years old.

Rosa consented to waiting in the taxi until someone arrived to get Raimu, just in case. One or two strangers approached the little girl, probably asking where her parents were. Jin tensed, watching, as someone brought over a cop from the nearby station.

"She'll be fine," Rosa assured, also observing, and told the driver they could go now.

Jin still turned to look out the rear window, and as they joined the flow of traffic he saw Kame rushing onto the scene. Yamapi was right behind him, suit jacket flapping open and tie askew, his hair a tousled mess, scooping up his daughter while Kame hastily and apologetically offered an explanation to the officer. Jin was too far too see but he knew Kame was glancing around, looking for him. He'd find the watch on Raimu and understand what it meant.

"So that's the Ace of Spades," Rosa mused beside him. The taxi took them further and further away and soon the others were out of sight.

"You never heard about any of this from me." It was like the moment when he laid eyes on Kame's card back in the apartment, and Jin was seized with an intense, terrible fear that had been long-cultivated throughout years of partnership. If Kame's cover was blown, if Kame was being targeted, Jin would throw himself in front of a hail of bullets for him—and not to physically protect him because Kame didn't typically need physically protecting from anyone, least of all Jin. But the reason Jin was Kame's best partner was because he fiercely, insanely, possessively protected Kame's identity. The rest of the world could have the rest of the disposable names Kame used, the Court could have its Ace, but Kamenashi Kazuya belonged to Jin.

"No," Rosa agreed easily, unperturbed. "You were impressively tight-lipped about them."

Oh, Jesus, and the others, too? Well, small comfort it wasn't him who gave them away. He probably just made it worse. "Coming back here was the worst thing I could've done."

"Guilt doesn't make you a martyr, Jin. It just makes you guilty."

If that was the case he wondered why someone hadn't hung him already.

♥ || ♠

There was still a red stain on the carpet, although the body had been moved during the night while Jin tried to sleep with Raimu tucked under his chin. He was reluctant to explore the house any more than was necessary. Who knew what monsters lurked in the closets.

The kitchen was adequately stocked, and he helped himself to a bottle of Clearheart Vodka in the kitchen, mixing it in a glass with tonic and two slices of lime. Rosa had never really liked gin. She was more familiar to him when she changed out of her nice park clothes, scrubbing makeup off her face and coming out of the bathroom in just a pair of low rise jeans and black bra. Her skin was as white as he remembered, with a scar low on her back that she said she'd gotten from falling off her bike. He traced it with his fingertips as she stole a sip from his drink.

"Where did this really come from?"

Her lips curved in a smile, face tilted up at him in an innocent way. "Thinking of backstabbing me?"

"You're not worried that I will?"

In answer she retrieved and placed his gun on the countertop and slid it over. "Here."

Jin accepted it cautiously. True, she hadn't exactly been keeping it from him, but still. He ejected the clip and examined it but everything was left as it had been after being fired yesterday. "Where are we meeting this guy?"

"You'll see."

Fair enough; she wasn't worried about him threatening or hurting her, but she didn't trust him with information. Jin finished off his vodka tonic while Rosa threw on a dark shirt, holstered a Khar PM9 under a denim jacket, and snapped an elastic around her hair in a ponytail. She exchanged the sandals from the park for a pair of lace-up boots.

Something about her was indelibly recognizable now even though the ensemble was a bit different than what she'd preferred in LA. Something hidden being brought to surface, occasionally suggested but never before confirmed, the process of unveiling—Jin couldn't afford to keep looking. He'd rather go in blind.

"Lead the way," he said, and followed her out the door.

♥ || ♠

Rosa's gloved fist pounded a rhythmic signal on the door of warehouse 5-A. Her posture was relaxed with a pair of sunglasses resting on her nose, hair swaying in the breeze coming off the bay. The week's fair weather continued, nothing but sunshine and a few fluffy clouds passing by overhead, with showers scheduled for the weekend. Rosa had commented about watering the plants later today when they got back home.

"Shimura?" a young male voice asked from inside.

"It's Kato."

"You're early," said the guy who let them in, sliding the door shut behind them. Then he was kicking back in a chair with a handheld game under his nose in a flash.

Jin didn't give him a second glance, trailing Rosa's slim figure as she made her way towards the back. Immense crates were stacked in piles taller than his head on either side, pyramidal to allow for easy climbing, and several individuals perched or lounged on top of them. He and Rosa were good and surrounded. Jin's pulse quickened but he maintained his casual stroll until Rosa stopped below a catwalk. 

Above, a lanky man ceased pacing along the platform and gripped the thin railing to snarl, "It's about time."

Without blinking, Rosa reached into her jacket and turned her back on Tanuma, pressing the PM9 up under Jin's chin. His hands went up obligingly and he glared over her head at the nervous, sweating man that tried to hurry away, only to be blocked by two members of CARD on either side. The rest of them climbed down from the crates.

"I see," Rosa said, and flicked the safety off. Everyone kept their distance.

Except for Kame, whose measured steps took the stairs to join Tanuma on the catwalk, and he had the man ushered away with a wave of his hand. He then loosely clasped his hands together and leaned on the railing. "So."

"The credit's all yours," Rosa admitted with ease, turning so she could see Kame over Jin's shoulder and migrating the tip of the gun to a more comfortable level at the middle of Jin's spine. There was no anger or frustration tightening her tone, only a breezy admiration and smiling thoughtfulness, and Jin knew exactly what look she was giving Kame right now behind her sunglasses. A rush of pride was clawed over by alternating rakes of possessiveness and resentment.

"Show-off," Jin accused, and Kame narrowed his eyes, catching onto Jin's train of thought and standing there like a glorious bastard for all to see.

"I considered the possibility of you arranging something in advance," Rosa mused aloud. "I didn't think you'd get the place and time, though."

Kame slipped a hand into his pocket and pulled out something that flashed and sparkled under the bright warehouse lights. Jin's watch dangled from his fingers. "One of the timezones was off. Stopped at 3:00." Rosa might be habitually early, but Kame could be even earlier.

"I figured you might know about the GPS," Jin hurried to explain. He was a hair trigger away from being crippled in one sense or another no matter how he saw it, and rather than take his time he was going to rush into it and see where he ended up. "I was going to leave the watch with Raimu-chan myself, but you beat me to it. I didn't even need to come up with an excuse." The tiny device was now taped to the inside of his boot, functional after all. Taguchi had his uses besides telling bad jokes.

"I see," Rosa said again. He heard her sigh. "Well, Jin, your goal at least was accomplished. Maybe your luck will hold out since I'm not much of a team player, I'm afraid. For now, I'm walking."

Luck, hell. Gambling was the name of the game but they weren't stupid. They were all criminals anyways. Jin was pretty sure Rosa would pull the trigger if circumstances made her. He'd probably do the same. Right now he'd bet Ueda was in position on some rooftop with a bolt-action sniper. He could guess what Kame would do.

"All right," Kame said, and people dispersed back behind the crates to clear the way.

Rosa took Jin with her to the exit, and the same guy guarding the door opened it for her. Before stepping out she said, "You'll tell the cutie outside to hold his fire, won't you?"

_Shit._ But all Kame did was coolly tug his collar towards his mouth where a mic was taped. "Black Queen, we're letting the target walk."

_We are?_ Jin wondered, almost dared to hope. _We really are?_ Then Rosa spun him around, smiling with gun in hand as she lifted her shades, and girlishly rose up on her toes to kiss his cheek.

"I wasn't wrong though, was I? I'll see you around if you change your mind. Say hi to Raimu-chan for me." And with that she lowered the sunglasses and holstered the PM9 to simply... walk away.

Jin watched her figure retreat, his own frame tensed and winding to spring. It couldn't be that easy. It couldn't be. He knew how CARD worked, how this scenario was supposed to work, and what he was expected to do. Just before he burst out after her Kame caught up to him and seized his wrist in a tight grip. "It's fine, Jin. This time, it's fine."

"How can you—but she—"

"What would you do," Kame asked, _dared_ , "if there was no choice but to take her down?"

"I'd do it." Personally. Ueda wouldn't have gotten the chance.

"That's why we're letting her go." Jin almost didn't believe him until Kame added, "Don't do anything stupid. For once. That's all I ask."

Gratitude—if that was what Jin was feeling, and he wasn't sure, sunk into his system and overrode the shocks jolting along his nerves. "...I thought I told you to stop deciding things for me."

"Why can't you just shut up and be thankful?" Kame was snapping at him, not quite looking him in the eye, but Jin had gotten distracted staring at the familiar angles of his face that he didn't notice when Rosa had made it safely out of sight. "What's wrong with you now?" Kame finally asked after a minute had passed.

"I just remembered something. Some of Koyama's bullshit."

"You have another appointment with him, by the way."

Jin groaned, stopping short when a thought occurred to him and a grin spread across his face. Yeah, that would show that quack.

"What is it?" Kame prodded with a suspicious look. "What are you so happy about?

"Koyama's bullshit."

"Maybe his point didn't penetrate your thick skull."

"Maybe," Jin conceded, no longer caring. Identity crisis, whatever. "But I was thinking, you know me best, right? Better than I know myself." Perhaps there had been a few bumps along the way reconnecting, but their partnership was as solid as ever, guessing each other's moves without any planning ahead. The grip on Jin's wrist hadn't loosened in the slightest.

"Unfortunately," Kame said with a roll of his eyes.

Jin was smug enough to let the insult pass. "Then it's okay if I keep looking at you."

Kame called him a psychopath. Then he asked what Jin wanted to have for dinner.

♥ || ♠

"I'm back," Kame announced, probably looking as drowned as he felt. As quickly as the cherry blossoms scattered the rains had come, chilling the weather down for a while and leaving only the memory of warm sunshine. It was supposed to clear up in a couple more days.

"Welcome back," chorus multiple voices inside the apartment. This was becoming routine, and he'd already started looking for bigger place.

"Wait," Jin said before Kame could shrug out of his coat. "We're going out for dinner."

"In this weather?"

"Yeah, duh, sukiyaki." Jin pulled Raimu into his lap and poked her cheeks. "You can't say no to this face."

"Sukiyaki!" Raimu grinned up at him.

"And," Jin added, prodding at the boy next to him—gently, minding the arm that was still encased in a cast and would be for a while yet, but it allowed him to move around. "Kiet is a growing boy. He needs to eat well."

CARD had been unsuccessful in locating any family for him. He said he hadn't seen his parents in years and they'd sold him anyway, the youngest in a big, poor family. Jin had gone all mama bear and jumped to take him in, penniless though he was, taking out a loan from the organization in exchange for services when needed. Kame wasn't sure if Jin would ever manage to get away from them again, but he seemed content with the deal for now. Unfortunately, he also seemed to be operating under the assumption Kiet wouldn't have anything to do with CARD ever, but that was the boy's choice to make. Jin didn't know he was being seen as a role model. Kame sighed; at least he was forewarned. He'd cross the bridge when he came to it.

"Now you're just being stingy," Jin said, misinterpreting Kame's reaction. "I already got Pi to agree to pay for it, okay?" He held up his phone to display a message along with a photo of Kiet with a scarf tied around the lower part of his face brandishing a wooden kitchen spoon to Raimu's neck.

"if u want 2 c her again meet us @ usual place 6pm"

Kame imagined Yamapi's sputtering reaction and glanced at the clock on the wall. "We're going to be late if we don't leave now."

He couldn't tell who was more excited, Jin or the kids, as Raimu hurried into a lime green raincoat and matching boots, and Jin found a second umbrella. Kame hadn't even put his down yet. "Let's go, let's go," Jin said, herding them all out.

"You owe me," Kame said, allowing himself to be bossed back out into the downpour. They were probably going to be a little late anyway. It was Saturday night. He hoped Jin had made a reservation. On second thought, Kame reached for his phone to do it himself.

"Don't I always?" Jin took Raimu by the hand, and Raimu took Kiet's hand, and Kame pulled Kiet's hood up to cover his head. He wasn't sure if Kiet was copying Jin's fashion or if it was being imposed, but both thieves recoiled as Raimu stomped her boots into a puddle, grinning hugely. "What?" Jin asked, laughing, when he noticed he was under scrutiny.

Kame shook his head, only saying, "You," as they walked to the station, and then he had to fend off Jin's peppering of "What about me, huh?" the rest of the way. Because it was Jin, Kame would break down and tell him eventually. How his world was bigger and better with Jin in it than it was without, and how he'd fight for that with all he had, because even cowards could survive. But he wanted to live like this.

♥ | WINNER TAKES ALL | ♠


End file.
